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ADDRESSES. 



INAUGURATION OF 



S. S. LAWS, LL. D., 



A8 PRESIDENT 



OF THE 



University oflVlissouri, 



AT COLUMBIA, 



Wednesday , July 5, 1876. 



UNIVERSITY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI. 



INAUGURATION 



OF 



S. S. LAWS, LL.D., 



AS PRESIDENT OF THE 



University of Missouri, 






AT COLUMBIA, 




On Wednesday, July 5, 1876. 



COLUMBIA, MO: 

Statesman Book & Job Office Prent. 

1876. 






INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 

By the Hon. James S. Rollins, President of the 
Board of Curators. 



Fellow Citizens : — We are here assembled on an occasion of sol- 
emn and transcendent interest. The day must in all future time be 
regarded as a historic day in the affairs of the University of the State. 

It closes an administration often years which has achieved a suc- 
cess for the Uniyersity, that within the same period scarcely finds a 
parallel in the history of similar institutions in our country. 

More than one year since, Dr. Read, the President, who has hitherto 
conducted the administration witli such signal ability and energy, 
gave notice to the Board, that he proposed on the Centennial day of 
the nation to retire from the presidency; and that he gave the notice 
thus long before hand, that the Board might have ample time to select 
a successor. 

On the 15th day of December last, the Board of Curators with perfect 
unanimity and after mature deliberation elected the Rev. S. S. Laws, 
and from this day he will enter upon duty. 

The Curators are here present, with this vast concourse of people, 
assembled to induct the President elect into office, and to welcome him 
to his great work. 

Prayer was then offered by Eld, L. B Wilkes. 



Inauguration of S. S. LAWS, LL. D., 

as President of the 

University of the State of Missouri, 

At Columbia, on 
Wednesday, July 5th, 1876, at 9 o'clock, a. m. 



PROGRAMME. 



MUSIC. 

Prayer by Eld. L. B. Wilkes, 

MUSIC. 

Address by Dr. Daniel Read, retiring President. 
Address on part of the Faculty by Joseph Ficklin, Ph. D. 

music. 
Address on part of Alumni by R. L, Todd, a. m. 
Address on part of the Students by Jno. H. Duncan. 
Address by Gov. Charles H. Hardin. [*] 

MUSIC. 

Address by Hon Jas. S. Rollins, President of the Board 

of Curators. 
Inaugural Address by PRESIDENT S. S. LAWS. 

MUSIC. 

Benediction by Rev. E. D. Isbell. 



[*] Gov. Hardin not being able to attend, Lt Gov. N. J. Colman res- 
ponded in his stead. 



■■■■■— i^ — 1 



Published by order of the Board of Cura- 
tors of the University. 



ADDRESS 

OF 

DR. DANIEL REA.D, 

AS RETIRING PRESIDENT. 

When one of the most illustrious of American statesmen 
— one who had spent his long life in the constant service 
of his country — was suddenly stricken down and was clos- 
ing his eyes upon the scene of his labors and his triumphs ; 
in the very moment of death, when all was fading forever 
from his mortal vision — the marble pillars, the gorgeous 
canopy of that magnificent hall, the anxious faces of his 
compeers gathered around him, he utteis the words — "This 
is the last of earth ;" and these were the last words that 
ever fejl from the lips of him known and recognized as the 
"old man eloquent." That to him was the supreme mo- 
ment — it was all over — it was the last of earth. 

Mr, President and Curators, Fellow- Professors, Students 
of the University, Fellow-citizens, shall I be pardoned, hum- 
ble as I am, if bearing the relation of President and Profes- 
sor, and in that capacity, now performing the very last act 
of a professional life extending over more than one-half of 
the present century, if in this supreme moment of my pro- 
fessional and official existence, and a? my eyes darken and 
my vision fades upon this University scene, so many the 
like of which, in some form, I have witnessed, and in for- 
mer relations to witness no more forever — if in this su- 
preme moment, I feel and say, "this is the last of earth," 
and to me it is the last! To labor is indeed to live — to be 
useful, says the great German poet Gcethe — that is life. 

Activity, responsibility, absorbing interest, is life ; noth- 
ing else is. That is my own feeling — the inmost sentiment 



[6] 

of my heart — the conviction not less of my understanding 
and when I leave this life, it is death. 

Not for the three-score and ten, the whole allotted peri- 
od of natural human life ; but for three score lacking 
actually lsss than three years, have I as student, or teacher,* 
or professor lived a University life. It is the only life I 
know, or have ever known. When that is gone no matter 
the cause ; even my own predetermined purpose and re- 
solve, my self-respect, my conviction of duty, increasing 
age, the petty or the weighty cares of administration ; it is 
nevertheless the last of earth to me. 

Yet as a University man, it has been my lot to have had 
more of public life, and to have mingled more with public 
men, in public scenes ; with legislators, business men, the 
recognized leaders of opinion, than is usual with mere col- 
lege men. I have done so in the great interests of railroads, 
of banking, of improvement in our state constitutions, of 
legislation for our common schools and for higher institu- 
tions of learning, of the increase and diffusion of knowl- 
edge, and for social advancement; indeed, all the interests 
of our northwest in its unparalleled developments ; but it 
has been my University life that I have really lived — that 
I have valued and clung to, and for it forsaken all else, 
even under strong and repeated temptations to the contra- 
ry. My troth has been to it alone ; nor, I can say truly in 
this hour of solemn review, I have never been faithless to 
plight or duty. Erred, I may have — mistaken I may have 
been — never coming up to my own ideal, certainly; but I 
can this hour, lay my hand upon my heart, and say I have 
at least tried to do my duty. Among you, and to you, I 
have tried to do my duty. I have never been negligent or 
careless, or unpunctual or unthoughtful ; I have never 
spared myself — I have never devoted myself to any other 
business — I have neglected my own. I have given my 
soul and life to my work here and elsewhere — and in State 
Universities only, have I labored, and in four of the very 
leading states of the northwest, which to-day round outand 



[7] 
number more than eight millions of people. Here has 
been my whole University life. 

Here, in this wonderful region, have been my birth, my 
home, my labor, my pride, my hope, my happiness, my in- 
spiration to do and to act — here in this great northwest, 
where civilization has advanced and grown up as never 
anywhere else upon the face of the earth and as never be- 
fore in the same space of time ; where have been built up 
institutions of learning and systems of education which are 
to-day looked upon with unmingled admiration by philo- 
sophic educators the whole world over. 

I am thankful to Almighty God, that I have been per- 
mitted to live and to labor in such a country, in this peri- 
od, too, of its progress and development, and to act. how- 
ever humbly, with the men who have laid suchfoundations^ 
and done such deeds for country and humanity. 

CHANGE MUST COME IN ALL HUMAN THINGS. 

But certainly, Mr. President, there is nothing of earth 
that we must not leave. As was last year so pertinently 
said by our excellent Governor in this chapel, when utter- 
ing some kind word of myself and my poor services, "Men 
must," said he, "grow old- -they must die even; we can- 
not have the services of the best men always," — this is the 
very order of Providence. Change, we all know, must 
come, and out of change comes higher development — a 
better life. So, I trust — I doubt not, will it come from the 
present change. 

I am set down, Mr. President, on the programme of the 
occasion to speak as "the retiring President" — a most diffi- 
cult role — a hard, an almost ungracious task. Yet some 
times there is a solemnity in last words, in last acts that 
awakens interest — that even moves the heart. 

But I do not forget that among all the religionists of this 
earth — in the ancient, or the mediaeval, or the modern 
world — among those who worship stocks or stones, or 
creeping things, or dumb animals, among those who wor- 
ship the works of their own hands, or the objects of nature — 



[8] 

those that worship the bright luminary of day ; there is 
not a sect or tribe that worships the setting sun. The ob- 
ject of worship is the rising sun. This is human nature, 
the order of which I would not reverse or change — least 
of all this day, were it even in my power. 

The interest of this occasion is, it must be, it ought to be 
elsewhere — not in the retiring President — not in the words 
he shall utter — not in the good-bye which shall fall from 
his lips, but in the incoming President. Nevertheless cus- 
tom — possibly propriety — requires the appearance of the 
humbler figure, and that he should give utterance to 
thoughts which the occasion naturally inspires. Sometimes 
the evening, the lengthening shadows, the cool hour of the 
closing day awaken solemn review and sober reflection. 
I would, if left to myself, have preferred "to step out" in si- 
lence, if not in oblivion. 

As the retiring President, then, I am to speak — what as 
such can I say? I retire this hour from the administration 
of the University — I retire from these scenes — from these la- 
bors — from these cares — from these anxieties, annoyances, if 
you will — from these halls — from this home consecrated by 
death — (oh, that death !) I retire from the association of 
these curators, professors, students, from friends (and many 
of them) as true and faithful as man ever had, from ene- 
mies and maligners, (few indeed, I thank God,) and not one 
with any cause for being such, except their own sectional 
malignity. From these all I retire. 

SOLEMN INAUGURATION VOW. 
Upon my inauguration nine years ago, I made this prom- 
ise from the stand which I now occupy, with the solemnity 
of an oath: "I promise," I said, with upraised hand, "be- 
fore God to keep back no part of the price — to consecrate 
whatever I have upon this altar of my country — to devote 
myself in all my energies whatever they are to the upbuild- 
ing of the University, to make it the crowning glory of the 
state system of education." This was my solemn vow. 
In the very same utterance I said, "except the Lord build 



[9] 

the house, they labor in vain that build it;" recognizing 
that without God we can do nothing. 

SELF-INQUISITION. 
Standing now in the very same spot, after these years of 
labor, I call myself to solemn inquisition : Have I fulfilled 
the vow then made ? Have I done what I could ? Have 
I been faithful, honest, true, earnest in this service ? Have 
I kept back any part of the price ? Have I been instant 
in season and out of season ? Have we had the blessing 
of Almighty God upon our labors? Has the opus corona- 
bit Deus been fulfilled to us ? Has God raised up for us 
helpers where we least expected ; has He so changed the 
minds and hearts of men, so that those most bitterly op- 
posed to the University and its location, became its great- 
est benefactors, voting it money and means — and in fact its 
only benefactors, doing for it what its professed friends 
would never do ; and possibly never will do ? 

Whatever may have been my own shortcomings and 
failures — -my derelictions or omissions ; whatever the draw- 
backs from any source ; this I can truly say, — that, know- 
ing as I did the slow progress of Universities — often from 
their slow growth called "the trees of centuries," my high- 
est expectations, and even hopes, have been more than re- 
alized. 

Yet when I consult my wishes and desires, when I look 
forward and around "with the prophetic eye of taste," when 
I forecast what energy and tact, and the audacity of enter- j 
prise, if you please, may do ; and what ought to be done j 
to complete the University of this great state, I feel that 
nothing, absolutely nothing has been done — hardly the cor- 
ner stone has been laid, so much there remains to be done. 
I take heart, however, when I look at other institutions ; 
or compare ourselves with ourselves. 

The accomplished work of this administration, Mr. Pres- 
ident, short as it is, yet the longest by nearly two years in 
the history of the University — there it is, just as it is — 
there it will remain well done, or ill done — there it will re- 



main forever. No praise or exaggeration of friends or ad- 
mirers — no vituperation or undervaluing or falsehood, no 
detraction, no inuendoes of the envious can change or alter it. 
What is done, is done — the past at least is safe — omnip- 
otence itself cannot change that. There may be detraction 
and abuse even — that is the privilege of the vulgar and the 
bad — common everywhere. When Washington himself 
retired, there were senators who stood up in their places, 
and declared it an event to be rejoiced over, and voted 
against the usual resolutions of approbation. Yet all this 
changed nothing of the merits of his administration. 

CLAIM NOT FOR SELF, BUT FOR GOOD AND 
TRUE WORKERS. 
The funds, buildings, number of students, professors, de- 
partments, library, apparatus, aid to students, grounds, 
lands for endowment, (250,000 acres still remaining), rates of 
tuition reduced, improvements in all existing means and 
appliances ; I have no time, nor do I care, to specify, what 
they are, what they were — I pass all these by. So far as I 
am individually concerned, I would have them go for noth- 
ing. For changes almost marvelous, in the midst of in- 
credible difficulties, prejudices, wrong and obsolete notions, 
sectionalism and partyism, accomplished in less than a de- 
cade of years, I will claim for myself, fellow -citizens, just 
as little credit as any one shall please to award me — even 
if it be nothing whatever. 

There are, however, I desire here to say, there are other 
minds and other hearts who have been engaged in this 
great work never, never, by you to be forgotten or over- 
looked — men who have been engaged with an earnestness, 
devotion of purpose, a sacrifice of personal ease, which 
none but the best and truest men ever make, which the 
public seldom know, and never appreciate, When I cease 
to mention these co-laborers, or their predecessors, who 
with so little did so much, or when I claim for myself one 
jot or tittle of the merit which belongs to them, may my 
tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth. 



[II] 

It may be some/satisfaction perhaps to me, I confess, 
that the men who have done the most have attributed the 
most to my poor efforts ; while it is a solace that I have 
been maligned only by those who have stood by and have 
neither done, nor could do, nor cared to do anything what- 
ever in the common cause and common work. Such have 
been the bane and curse of this institution from the begin- 
ning — less in my own administration than in any preceding 
efie ; and I hope for the honor of this beautiful and highly 
^cultivated village to be none whatever henceforth and for- 
ever. 

WORK OF THOSE WHO HAVE DONE NOTHING. 

What, I ask, have and and and and 

done ? Yes they have done their peculiar work. They 

have, according to their ability, sown the seeds of dissatisfac- 
tion — they have encouraged disorder and mischief — they 
have consorted with politicians to drag the University into 
the miserable slough of party politics — the usual and easy re- 
sort of the small neighborhood politicians, who assume to 
control what they have done nothing to create. "It re- 
quires no talent at all to do mischief," said Witherspoon in 
a college address almost a century ago, and as true to-day 
as then. 

But for them you would have had this day, fellow-citi- 
zens, buildings, and improvements, and enlarged founda- 
tions, which remain for the accomplishment of the coming- 
administration, and which I believe and trust in God, will 
soon be established and realized fact. 

UNIVERSITY IMPROVEMENTS HAVE NOT JUST 

HAPPENED. 

Whatever, fellow-citizens, has been done during the past 
administration, much or little, has not come about by 
chance or accident; any more than this world just happen- 
ed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms. Whatever has been 
done, has been done according to a fixed plan laid down in 
the beginning — has been done in the face of opposition, of 
prejudice, of ignorance ; and never by those who have 



[12] 

never done, or planned, or helped. It has been by labor, 

and counsel ; by work, night and day ; by skillful 

and experienced legislative management. Not a single 

improvement has just happened or come of itself. 

THIS CLASS APOLOGIZED FOR-ALWAYS HAVE 
BEEN, ALWAYS WILL BE. 

He is a poor philosopher of human nature, and little 
read in the history of the world's progress, who complains 
that in the very best and noblest of human enterprises there 
are fault-finders and hinderers, revilers and slanderers, and 
opposers. Why in the order of Providence do they exist 
may be hard to tell. The question put in the Bible, "Why 
do the wicked live/' is not answered even in the infallible 
word of inspiration. In all ages they ha^e lived. In the 
days of Homer, three thousand years ago, he, the great 
father of poetry, has presented the type of one of this class 
— Thersites his name. "Scandal his delight supreme." 
When the greatest work of antiquity was to be accomplish- 
ed — a proud empire to be destroyed, and a new one to be 
founded, and the confederate hosts of Greece with their 
heroes were gathered for the mighty work — (this was be- 
fore the art of printing had been invented, or newspapers 
established) — Thersites was there to create distrust and op- 
position and defeat ; and especially to abuse the leaders, 
Agamemnon, Achilles and Ulysses. Ulysses, finding him 
in his foul work, beat him with his scepter to the great de- 
light of the army, until the pain caused him to weep and 
writhe; Ulysses at the same time, uttering these character- 
istic words, as apposite and exactly applicable to-day to 
this class as they were then : 

"Cease, factious monster, the man who does the least upbraids the 

■% 
most ; 

Except detraction what has thou bestowed?" 

His figure, says Homer, such as might his soul pro- 
claim. But I will not quote — I do not wish to describe in- 
dividuals or name personal defects. 

Thanks that of this class there are so few f and that 
they have so signally failed— -that they have ac- 



[13] 
complished so little — that they have fallen by their 
own designs and sunk so low in the estima- 
tion of their fellow-citizens as to be almost beyond the pow- 
er of mischief — that the government of the University is 
upon safer and firmer foundations than ever before, fixed by 
the constitution itself, and is now, it is to be hoped, forever 
beyond the reach of such manipulators. 

TO THE CITIZENS OF COLUMBIA, 

For myself, my fellow-citizens of Columbia, I take this 
occasion to express all that words can express — and how 
poor and feeble they are — to express to vou my deep, fer- 
vent, heartfelt gratitude. What can I say at this hour ? 
Since I have been among you, my life has been the Uni- 
versity. It has not been, as you will bear me witness, so- 
ciety or politics or the church, or any object except that 
which brought me to you. Indeed, in the one object, I 
have almost lost the individuality of my existence. The 
ties which have bound me to you in your families and 
homes, have been fewer than I would have chosen to make 
them. Nevertheless, I know not how I could have had 
warmer sympathies. When unworthy things have been 
said or done, you haye expressed far greater indignation 
than I or mine have ever done. This with the exception 
only of a few, though with you, not of you. When at- 
tempts have been made, vile and infamous, they have 
through you reacted upon their authors. At this hour I 
would 'remember only kindnesses, good deeds, co-opera- 
tion and support. When death entered my house and 
struck down her who had been so long by my side, the 
light and strength of my life, you were with me, and the 
stricken ones left of my household, in that dreadful hour, 
to give all the comfort that earth could afford. And how 
inexpressibly sad to me the reflection rushing upon my 
mind at this hour, that had Providence spired her a little 
longer, this very day would have been the anniversary of 
the golden day when in early youth we plighted our lives 
on the sacred altar! 



[14] 
To the women of Columbia especially, I know not in 
what terms to express my gratitude, or my appreciation 
for acts done, and words of confidence and support spoken 
far beyond all the ordinary courtesies of refined life. 

I know full well it will not be forgotten by the women 
of Missouri — that indeed it will by them be commemora- 
ted as a peculiar distinction of this administration, that the 
doors of the University have been opened to them ; and its 
full privilegas have been accorded to the daughters not less 
than to the sons of the state. For this at least, I may 
claim something of their regard and kindly remembrance. 

And now in charity for all and malice toward none, with 
love and friendship for many, with words of apology and 
pity even for the few base and injurious among you, and 
who have injured you more than me, I part with you, no 
more to mingle in your circles, or to counsel with you in 
establishing and building up your greatest interest. 

TO THE CURATORS. 

To the members of this honorable Board of Curators, are 
in a special manner due my thanks for personal and offi- 
cial consideration, always eminently proper, dignified, cor- 
dial and confidential. You, as a Board of Curators, are 
the legislature of the University, acting under the laws of 
the state and the grant act of congress as your constitution 
to which all action of the Board must conform, as well as 
that of the President and Faculty. To you as the legisla- 
ture, while I have been most free in the communications 
required of me as your executive officer, I trust I have in 
no instance trenched upon the boundaries of propriety. 

When about to leave your service I gave you a notice 
of nearly a year and a half, that you might have the least 
possible embarrassment in finding a successor. It is not 
an easy task to find a University president — a scholar, a 
business man, having will and purpose, tact and exper- 
ience. 

Such a president, I trust and believe "you have found ; 
and to him I can truly say, he will find the legislative body 



[if] 

of the University both progressive and conservative, and 
most hearty in sustaining him, and earnest in their efforts 
to build up the University. 

TO THE INCOMING PRESIDENT, 

And to him, and now yielding to his abler hands the 
work which has been committed to me, I beg to say : 

You, honored sir, enter upon your high office under cir- 
cumstances most favorable — with full experience not only 
as an educator, but as a business man, with a financial ex- 
perience falling to the lot of few (a great preparation for 
your work as president.) Dr. Day, of Yale, indeed was in 
the habit of saying, "The first qualification of a college 
president is to be a financier." Since his time that qualifi- 
cation has become still more necessary — indeed an indis- 
pensable requisite, with the vastly increased endowments 
and wider range of the University. The president now 
needs to be a man of affairs. I care not how systematized 
departments or business arrangements may be, his eye 
must be over all, his inspiring presence everywhere, he 
must know everything ; just as did that wonderful business 
man, of our great metropolitan city, recently deceased. 

He needs not only scholarly attainments in science and 
literature; but he must also have the hundred eyes of Ar- 
gus and the hundred hands of Briareus — at least, he needs 
them. 

In this great enterprise, in this great empire state, in the 
very center of this great Republic, I bid you, sir, God- 
speed. 

SOME MERIT CLAIMED FOR A CHANGE IN THE 
GOVERNMENT OF THE UNIVERSITY. 

Before closing what I have now to say — there is one 
thing in the polity of the University as now established, as 
to which I will claim some merit; at least so far as influ- 
ence is concerned in bringing about the change. When I 
came to the University not ten years since, I found a large 
board of twenty-two Curators, chosen upon a joint ballot 
of the two houses of the legislature — that is, chosen in cau- 



[i6] 

cus, or by the local members or some neighborhood poli- 
tician who would interest himself in the matter. 

In such a mode of choosing University curators there 
was neither wisdom nor safety. Yet the attempt was ac- 
tually made to restore it, through orte of your own repre- 
sentatives ! 

The first improvement made was to give the appoint- 
ment to the Governor, with the consent of the senate, But 
there were still twenty-two members — quite enough to kill 
any University, as has been well said ! The Board itself 
felt the evil of so large a body, and recommended a reduc- 
tion of the number. 

A PIECE OF NOTABLE STATESMANSHIP WITH 
APOLOGY FOR THE STATESMAN. 

But here came in a notable piece of statesmanship — the 
number of the Board was actually increased, and the legis- 
lator introducing this particular improvement, had himself 
appointed to one of the places thus created, contrary to the 
constitution of the state which he had sworn to support ! 
But for gross mental ignorance, this of course, would have 
been moral perjury. 

This grand coup de etat led the way to the change which 
was made in the constitution itself (thus good came out of 
evil) requiring that the government of the University shall 
be in a Board of Curators to consist oinine to be appoint- 
ed by the governor and confirmed by the senate. I will 
not dwell upon this important change. It gives stability, 
responsibility and character to the University government. 
Henceforth changes cannot be made, to suit personal or 
party views or individual malice. 

THE UNIVERSITY MADE A PART OF THE STATE 
AND TO BE AIDED AND MAIN- 
TAINED AS SUCH. 

There is still another great improvement in our Univer- 
sity polity. The University with its departments is estab- 
lished by the fundamental law of the state. The state is to 
aid and maintain the University with these several depart- 
ments as now existing. The Curators can go before the 



[17] 

legislature with the constitution in their hands, and demand 
the necessary aid for these departments. It is indeed their 
duty to do so — the command of the people spoken to them 
through the constitution. If they do not make the demand 
of the legislature, and repeat it from year to year, until the 
demand is properly responded to, they are guilty of a great 
and inexcusable misfeasance. 

FAREWELL. 

As I turn now to those who have been bound to me in 
the relations of daily toil, to the Faculty and the Students, 
I cannot trust myself to speak. I cannot speak as I would 
— the hasty good-bye —the God bless you — may the choic- 
est of Heaven's blessings rest upon you, must be the only 
utterances of the moment. And what more can I say, or 
have the heart to say ? 

Yes, yes — I have something else more heartfelt— more 
pertaining to my own wishes and feelings and to my own 
duty. 

If I have ever uttered one improper word, or done one 
act of unkindness or in aught given unnecessary pain, I crave 
forgiveness. I ask it first of Almighty God and then of 
you. I know that I have in some things been urgent, pos- 
sibly exacting ; I think never so much of others as of my- 
self. It has been eagerness to do the best — and to make 
a perfect institution of learning, perfect in order, in disci 
pline, in work, in exclusive devotion to the one great ob- 
ject. 

Fellow-citizens, Curators, Professors, Students! It is 

now the last. I retire not a richer man, certainly, than I 
came to you- -in no respect personally better ofif-— in many 
much worse. I have given you ten years, the best of my 
life ; I have had during these years care, labors, anxiety, sor- 
row of heart, oppression of spirit. I hope there is some 
fruit to others of all these years, some good. This at least 
I have had-"-it has been a pleasure to me to work for a 
great cause--of that fruit, no one can deprive me. 

I have only to utter my closing farewell. The word lin- 
gers upon my lips— Farewell. 



> , 



ADDRESS 

OF 

PROF. JOSEPH FICKXIIST 

ON PART OF THE FACULTY. 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : It was deem- 
ed appropriate that the Faculty of this University should 
be represented on this occasion, and I have been designat- 
ed to speak in their behalf. 

There are epochs in the history of individuals and of in- 
stitutions when a thoughtful mind feels that unusual signi- 
ficance and gravity attend every word and every act. 

Such I regard the present occasion, when I, in behalf of 
the Faculty of this institution, stand before these two great 
men, Dr. Daniel Read and Dr. S. S. Laws, to bid the one 
farewell and the other welcome. I feel oppressed by the 
responsibility that is thus laid upon me, and regret that 
this delicate and difficult task was not entrusted to some 
other member of the Faculty better qualified to perform it. 

Ten years ago, while forming plans for the enlargement of 
this University,, and devising ways and means for increasing 
its power and usefulness, that eminent man and profound 
scholar, Dr. John H. Lathrop, was taken from us by the 
hand of death. 

After the death of Dr. Lathrop, the Board of Curators 
called to. the Presidency Dr. Daniel Read from the Univer- 
sity of Wisconsin. 

Only two members of the present Faculty, Dr. Norwood 
and myself, were here when he came, and no one knows 
better than we the progress that has been made in the last 
decade. 



[•9] 
At the beginning of Dr. Read's administration, we had 
simply the College of Science and .Arts. 

Nozv, we have, in addition to that, the College of Nor- 
mal Instruction, the Agricultural College, the School of 
Mines, the Law College and the Medical College. 

Our endowment then was small, and the income from it 
very uncertain. 

To-day, although our means are not as ample as they 
ought to be, and, as we trust, they will be, they are very 
respectable, amounting, in buildings, lands, libraries, ap- 
paratus and endowment funds, to near one million of dol- 
lars. 

Then we had no means of cheap boarding. Now we 
have three boarding clubs which have enabled huadreds 
of young men of moderate means to attend the University. 

Prior to 1866, I think the number of students in the Uni- 
versity during any one year never exceeded 250. During 
one year of the last decade we had 553. 

While it is true that this advance in prosperity and use- 
fulness has been the result of the combined, wisdom and ef- 
forts of all the friends of the institution, it is well known 
that our retiring President, Dr. Read, by his sagacity, un- 
tiring energy and unflagging zeal, has contributed very 
largely to that result. 

In the midst of discouragements and opposition, always 1 
at his post, he continued to work day and night, "in sea- 
son and out of season," in sickness and in health. 

But, I doubt not, in looking back over his arduous la- 
bors, he feels that what he has accomplished here is the 
crowning work of a long and useful life: 

Dr. Read : — As the President of our Faculty you have, 
with wonderful energy and zeal, labored with us for ten 
years, in the arduous and responsible work of instructing 
and training the youth of our land, and in placing the Uni- 
versity on such a firm foundation, that the people of the 
state may feel proud of it, and, while you have not accom- 



[20] 

plished as much as either you or we could desire, yet you 
have a right to look with pride on the results of your la- 
bors. It has been truly said that "The office of teacher is 
the highest and most responsible that man can fill." 

For half a century you have been holding that office in 
State Universities, and you came to us with the accumu- 
lated wisdom and experience of 40 years, to help us broad- 
en and deepen the foundations of the chief institution of 
learning in the great state of Missouri. 

It must be a source of great satisfaction to you, sir, to 
look back over the long line of students who have receiv- 
ed from you counsel and instruction, whose characters have 
been largely moulded by your hands, and who have gone 
out as your missionaries into the world to labor for a high- 
er and better civilization. 

On this, the first day of the second century of this Re- 
public, you sever your official connection with us and this 
institution ; but, in a sense, you do not leave us; your in- 
fluence will be felt here in ever-widening curves through- 
out all coming time; you will live in the many able official 
documents you have written, the lectures you have deliv- 
ered, and in the youth you have instructed. 

Before closing I desire, .on this public occasion, to thank 
you personally, for your kindness, your wise counsels, and 
for your words of sympathy and encouragement. 

Permit me to say in conclusion, that the kind wishes of 
the Faculty follow you ; that we trust you may have many 
years remaining to you, in which to labor in the cause of 
education, and that when the end comes, you will be able 
to look back with joy and satisfaction, over a long life 
spent in training the young in correct methods of reason- 
ing and inspiring them with a lofty and noble ambition. 
Farewell ! 

Dr. Laws: — In behalf of the Faculty, I have the honor 
to welcome you to the arduous duties and grave responsi- 
bilities of the position to which you have been called. 

While it may be truly said that very much progress has 



[21] 

been made during the administration j ust closed, it is equal- 
ly true that our institution is as yet in its infancy, and that 
very much remains to be done. 

At present I know no position offering as many oppor- 
tunities for doing a grand and noble work for humanity as 
that to which you are now called. Our state is centrally 
located in one of the most highly favored regions on this 
planet ; it is large ; it has a fertile soil and a healthy 
climate ; it is washed and traversed by some of 
the noblest rivers in the world ; and its wealth in minerals, 
is incalculable. The true greatness of a state however 
does not lie chiefly in her material wealth, but in the pur- 
ity and integrity of her citizens, in her literature, science 
and art. 

In your efforts to make this institution, over which you 
have been called to preside, the great store-house of intel- 
lectual capital, the great fountain of spiritual and moral 
power, the great throbbing heart, as it were, sending out 
its pure and benificent streams to the remotest corners of 
this broad land, I pledge you the sympathy, the support 
and hearty co-operation of the whole Faculty. 

I feel, sir, that the wisest and most far-sighted among us, 
have, as yet, only caught glimpses of the grand and glorious 
destiny that awaits this institution. "It does not yet appear 
what she shall be." 

You have been selected by the Board of Curators to be 
our leader in the work of advancing toward that destiny. 
We have great confidence in the wisdom of their choice, 
and we promise to stand by your side in the great and good 
work in which you and we have been called to labor. 

In the name of the Faculty, sir, I bid you God-speed 
and tender to you our most cordial greeting. 



RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY THE FACULTY. 
Whereas, Dr. Daniel Read, having been for a half century identified 

with the work- of collegiate instruction, and for the past ten years Pres- 



[22] 

ident of this University, is now about to sever finally his official con- 
nection with us; therefore be it 

Resolved, That Ave hereby express our sense of the service which he 
has rendered to the cause of education in the west, the energy and per- 
sistence with which he has advocated the claims of higher instruction, 
and especially the zeal, diligence and efficiency with which he has la- 
bored in this, his latest Held, to keep the interests of the University be. 
fore the people, and to commend it to public favor, at a lime when such 
effort was indispensable to success. 

Resolved, That we take pleasure in recalling his fidelity to recog- 
nized duty, his devotion to those interests which he considered para- 
mount, and all tke exertion he made to secure that harmony of feeling 
and unity of action in the Faculty, which has characterized his admin- 
istration. 

Resolved, That we congratulate him upon the circumstances of 
prosperity and signs of promise for the University under which he 
takes leave of the institution which has been the object of his care. 

Resolved, That ws offer to Dr. Read our cordial good wishes for his 
future. 



ADDRESS 

OF 

MR. JOHN H. DUNCAN 

ON PART OF THE STUDENTS. 

President of the Board, Ladies and Gentlemen, and 
Most Worthy and Esteemed President: — I count my- 
self happy, in being designated to speak the parting word 
of the young ladies and gentlemen of this University, to 
one who has been so proficient, as a presiding officer ; so 
successful as a teacher, and so truly alive to all the educa- 
tional interests of our state. 

Having been, Mr. President, the recipients of so many 
blessings and educational advantages at your hands, we 
would be none other than inhuman to have no feelings of 
gratitude welling up in our hearts for you. But still more 
so, if having them, we should refuse, in an hour like this, 
to give them utterance. 

It is my conviction that educators, as a class, at least 
until recently, have not shared that degree of honor and 
consideration their work so justly merits. If we bestow 
such lasting honors upon him who shapes the marble, or 
transfers ideals to the canvas, what reward is due him 
who spends his life in shaping, developingand giving power 
to the mind ? As we view, to-day, your life-work, and see 
that you have not lived in vain, but for 5 1 years have labor- 
ed so successfully in behalf of the youth of our great com- 
monwealth, we not only find cause for gratitude, but have 
placed before us an example of devotion and singleness of 
purpose, worthy of our most ardent admiration and careful 
imitation. 



[24] 
But to speak more particularly of your relation to the 
youth of our own state : I feel that we have reason to con- 
gratulate ourselves in having enjoyed the last years of your 
long and rich > experience, as an educator and presiding' 
officer of State Universities. 

By reason, too, of what you have accomplished for our 
University, in obtaining grants from the state for its en- 
largement and maintenance , and in every way increasing 
its educational facilities; and thus leaving us with an insti 
tution of which we may be justly proud, even amid the 
wonderful advancements of the nineteenth century, you 
have brought the youth of our land, under lasting obliga- 
tions of gratitude, for opportunities of education which 
without you they might never have enjoyed. But the 
work you have accomplished in building up the University 
of Missouri has influenced and blessed other states than 
our own. Nor are these benefits soon to pass away — they 
are permanent. So that now, and in time to come, the 
youth of very many states, whether they rise up and bless 
you or not, will themselves be blessed by you. 

Our Father in Heaven alone knows how much wiser and 
better the world has been made by your having lived in it; 
and I sincerely hope that the influence you have exerted 
upon the educational interests of our state may never fail 
to be realized. As regards the students who have been 
under your charge in this University, I believe I can safe- 
ly say, that all who are worthy of the name of students, have 
none other than the kindliest feelings for, you, and many 
join in the common regret of your retiring from the posi- 
tion you have so long and so faithfully filled. 

But only those who have sat at your feet in your own 
class room, know how to properly appreciate your worth. 
By your natural aptitude, your broad and deep culture, as 
well as quick perception of human nature, you have been 
eminently qualified for teaching. Among your many grad- 
uates I have met no one, who has followed with you through 
the rich fields of moral, mental and political science, who 



[25] 

I has not expressed himself as exceedingly thankful and 
grateful for the privilege. So deep and heartfelt, indeed, 
was this feeling with your present, and last senior class, 
that we considered it a duty incumbent upon us, to present 
you, in the form of resolutions, an expression of our high 
appreciation of your scholarship, and gentlemanly bearing 
toward us, and sincere gratitude for having been taught to 
know and to think, as we never had before. 

Permit me, in this hour of our separation, to assure you 
on behalf of the students whom I represent, that in taking 
leave of us, you bear with you our kindliest sympathies 
and most tender regards 

We hope not to be entirely forgotten by you, but trust 
that we may so labor and deport ourselves, that we too 
may be, as have others, a source of consolation and com- 
fort to you in your few remaining years. 

And now, praying if the will of God be so, that length 
of days, and strength of body and mind, may still be grant- 
ed you for even greater usefulness — in behalf of the Stu- 
dents I bid you a kind, but sad Farewell. 



RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY THE STUDENTS, 
The following resolutions were presented to Dr. Read 
on the part of the students, class of 1876: 

Whereas, More than fifty years of the life of our worthy and much 
respected President, Dr. Read, have been spent in the cause of educa- 
tion : and as this .almost unparalleled career of successful professional 
life is about to be brought to a close by his retirement from the Presi- 
dency of this University, and as our own relations so beneficial and 
endearing, are now to be severed; therefore, be it Resolved, by the 
members of this his last Senior Class : 

1st. That we hereby express our high appreciation of his services in 
his exalted sphere of action as a life-long educator, of his great and 
varied learning, of his uniformly kind and courteous bearing towards 
us, both in the class room, and also when in private house seeking his 
advice and counsel. 

2nd. That during our Senior year, when brought into intimate rela- 
tions and almost companionship with our President, there have been 
cherished on our part only the kindest and most grateful sentiments 



[26] 

which have ripened into a reverent friendship and esteem, and on his 
there has been manifested a constant and tender consideration of onr 
peculiar wants as a band of youth soon to enter upon the trials of life, 
of which he has had so large an experience. 

3rd. That we assure him, that he leaves the institution with his name 
engraven in indelible characters on the tablets of our memories, and 
that there will ever cluster around it some of the purest pleasures of 
our college life; and that henceforth wherever his lot may be cast, and 
in whatever sphere of exalted usefulness he may be called to act, or 
however widely separated we may be, he will bear with him the sympa- 
thies, the best wishes, and the fervent gratitude of this Senior Class. 

4th. That we desire at this parting hour to give expression to the 
sentiments of our hearts, joining with the great army of his pupils in 
all lands, in the commendation of Dr. Read, as the old and tried ed- 
ucator, the true gentleman, the scholar of eminent attainments, as the 
teacher who has taught us the best of all lessons, "How to Think." 

5th. That a copy of these resolutions be presented to the Board of 
Curators, also to the Faculty and to Dr. Read. 



ADDRESS 

OF » 

ROBERT Xi. TODD, J±. M-, 

ON PART OF THE ALUMNI. 

President Read. Ladies and Gentlemen: — I beg to 
be indulged in a brief personal reminiscence. Almost 
twenty-seven years have passed since President John H. 
Lathrop, — elarum et venerabile noinen — by whom this no- 
ble temple of learning was dedicated, closed his connec- 
tion with this University to mould and build up that of 
Wisconsin. Then, in the infancy of our institution, it was 
my privilege -may I not say honor ? — as the oldest mem- 
ber of the first graduating class, that of 1843, an d as the 
representative of my fellow alumni, to convey to him as- 
surances of our admiration of his virtues as a man, of his 
learning, ability, faithfulness as a teacher. 

Now, when almost a generation has passed away, I am 
again asked, as the organ of the Alumni of the University, 
to say a few words to you, President Read, on your retir- 
ing from the chief office of the institution. 

Three score and ten years— seven decades — are the limit 
of our human life, as declared by the Psalmist. One de- 
cade of your life, taken when your wisdom was ripest and 
when your "eye was not dim, nor your natural force 
abated," has been consecrated to the cause of public edu- 
cation in the service of the State of Missouri, as the chief 
officer of her highest educational institution. By your own 
deliberately expressed and published purpose, your term 
of service ends to-day. At this historical period in the ca- 
reer of the University — the outgoing of one administration 
and the incoming of another — at this end of your decade 



[28] 

of service as its President, it would seem fitting to pause 
and recall and preserve — it may be for your cheer, it will 
certainly be for the encouragement and gratification of 
every friend of higher education — some facts tending to 
show what, if any, progress has been made towards lifting 
this school to a higher and broader plane of beneficence. 

Nothing can be more uncertain or more changeable 
than popular caprice or applause. The hero of to-day is 
the martyr of to-morrow, perhaps to have a yet grander 
apotheosis, when the reaction shall have set in ; and our 
Lord furnishes not a singlelar illustration of the "Hosanna' ' 
being followed by the cry, "Crucify him." The only true 
test is to be found when, ignoring the opinion of those 
who are often as ill-informed as they are decided, turning 
a deaf ear to popular clamor if it is unintelligent, throwing 
aside all prejudice, partiality or passion, we come to a 
calm and honest examination of results, and see what are 
the accomplished facts. To this test, Mr. President, wil- 
lingly or unwillingly, your administration of the affairs of 
the University will have to be subjected in the mind of an 
impartial public ; and by this test alone can we fairly de- 
termine whether substantial progress has been made by the 
| institution during your term of service. The remarks 
whicli follow are designed to aid us to an intelligent judg- 
ment on this question, unimbarrassed by the graces of 
rhetoric, and without any attempt at oratory. 

It will be within the memory of many, tho' we are prone 
to forget, that in the summer of 1866, the state was called 
to mourn ihe loss cf the accomplished scholar, finished 
gentleman and devout christian, Dr. Lathrop, who then 
filled the office of President of the University; that soon 
after\yard Dr. Read was elected his successor and came 
here to see over what he was called to preside and with 
what material he was to be provided for bis work. 

Let us recall what he found. This building in which 
we are convened, was the only college building except the 
Observatory — and this in a sad state of dilapidation result- 



[29] 

ing from long military occupation and neglect for want of 
means to keep it in repair ; one room reeking with the 
noisome odors of a military prison, another bearing traces 
unmistakable of having been used as the commissary de- 
partment; another for the quartermaster ; the library de- 
spoiled; apparatus scanty and broken ; the roof a poor 
protection against the descending rains, and the whole look- 
ing dingy and as if hastening to decay. Near by lay the 
ruins of the former President's house in all their unsightly 
suggestiveness of want of means even to have them removed. 
In the farther corner of the campus stood a wretched one- 
story frame building in which Dr. Lathrop had managed to 
shelter his family, and in which he died. The shrubbery 
and many of the trees had been killed, and the enclosure 
was tottering to its fall. So much for the external aspect. 
The sole endowment consisted of J 123,000 of stock in the 
old bank of the state of Missouri, and its branch at Chilli- 
cothe — the proceeds of lands donated by congress — which 
paid small dividends occasionally. For the year ending 
June 30, 1866, the total number of students was 104, the 
total income vvas $7,292.78. A President, three Professors 
and two Tutors composed the teaching force. To com- 
plete the picture, let me add, a debt of $20,000, teachers 
poorly paid in warrants which were flooding the market at 
60 cents on the dollar. Let it be remembered that, al- 
though the state constitution provided for the support of a 
State University by legislative action, up to the time of 
which I speak not one single dollar had ever been appropria- 
ted by the state in any manner whatever toivard the support 
of the institution. Nor was it at all clearly settled in the 
public mind that this was the University intended by the 
constitution. 

Addressing the General Assembly and expressing his 
willingness to undertake the work of building up a Uni- 
versity if the state should manifest a purpose to meet its 
self-imposed constitutional obligations, Dr. Read returned 
to Wisconsin to await results. The session of the General 
Assembly of 1866-7 will be forever memorable as that 



[30] 

when Missouri first showed a gleam of recognition of her 
duty to higher education by appropriating $10,000 to re- 
build the President's house and repair the main edifice; 
and by making the University, in some small degree, a 
charge on the revenues of the state, as the public schools, 
lunatic, deaf and dumb and blind asylums and penitentiary 
had long been. But the Rubicon was passed, and the 
state had now some right to claim this as her University. 
As early as 1863, Dr. Lathrop had called the attention of 
the Board of Curators to the important subject of connect- 
ing with, and making part of the Universitv, the Agricul- 
tural and Mechanical College, provided for by act of con- 
gress of July 2, 1862 ; and in 1865 the Board presented to 
the legislature a memorial to that end which formed the 
basis of all that has since been said and written on the sub- 
ject. During all the subsequent weary years this question 
vexed the wisdom of our Solons until its solution in 1870 
by the establishment of the Agricultural and Mechanical 
College — with three-fourths of 330,000 acres of land do- 
nated by congress, and the appropriation by Boone coun- 
ty of a farm of 640 acres and $30,000 in money, in connec- 
tion with the University here ; and the establishment at 
Rolla of the School of Mines and Metallurgy — a branch of 
the University — with one-fourth of the congressional land 
grant, and large donations of other lands by the people of 
Phelps county. The schemes proposed for the disposition 
of this land grant, the arguments made, the articles pub- 
lished in newspapers and otherwise, would make a large 
and interesting volume, and be a valuable contribution to 
the history of the state. I cannot do more now than to 
state that one scheme advanced by a profound thinker, and 
which had numerous advocates, was to found and endow 
out of these lands, a college which should meet the re- 
quirements of congress — that is, "without excluding other 
scientific and classical studies, and including military tac- 
tics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to 
agriculture and the mechanic arts" — thus covering al- 



[31] 
most the whole domain of human knowledge — in each of 
the then nine congressional districts of the state ! 

In 186S the Normal College was established and put 
into successful working order. In 1870, immediately after 
the action of the legislature disposing of the congressional 
land grant, the department of agriculture was organized, a 
Professor elected and classes formed in the special studies 
of that department. 

Meantime to meet the wants of those desirous of Uni- 
versity instruction, but unable to bear the expense of pri- 
vate boarding, the system of club boarding houses had 
been adopted, houses had been built ; to be followed by 
others larger and more permanent, so popular had the idea 
become among the students, until now 150 students can 
find accommodations in these houses. In these board has 
been had at the minimum of cost ; so low, indeed, that few 
could plead want of means as a bar to continuance in the 
college. It is a gratifying fact that many who won the hon- 
ors were from these boarding clubs. 

As a result of the establishment of the Normal Depart- 
ment, the women of the state — one half of our people, who 
had before been enjustly excluded from all benefits of the 
University, though bearing their proportion of the 
cost of its support — were admitted, on equal terms with 
men, to all the classes. The propriety of this step, in 
which this was soon followed by older institutions, has 
been vindicated by the uniform high character and good 
conduct of the young ladies, their influence on the young 
men, and the manner in which they have come to the front 
in the struggle for college honors, and borne from these 
halls the victor's palm. 

A necessary feature of the Agricultural College was, of 
course, the laboratory and analytical work, and the grand 
scientific building arose in obedience to the demands of 
the new college. Further to develop the true University 
idea and meet the wants of the state, Colleges of Law and 
Medicine were established, and have proven eminently suc- 
cessful. 



[32] 

So that now, sir, you are able to return to the Curators 
the trust confided to you, with this building in perfect or- 
der and greatly improved, with a library room surpassed by 
few in the country; the admirably arranged scientific build- 
ing ; the large normal building , the president's house, 
spacious and handsome ; seven houses for clubs, and the 
elegant Hudson mansion, with the group of buildings clus- 
tered around it ; the horticultural grounds and college 
farm and appurtenances ; the library, general and profes- 
sorial, and means of illustration largely increased ; the 
grounds improved and beautified, and the University fully 
organized with its Colleges of Arts, Normal Instruction, 
Agriculture, Law, Medicine, and the School of Mines and 
Metallurgy, employing for all about 30 professors and 
teachers, all in successful operation. 

The endowment has increased from $123,000 of unpro- 
ductive bank stock, to $23 1,000 of productive stocks, in ad- 
dition to the income from the congressional land grant, the 
state revenue and from the Rollins' fund. By your good 
management some $ 12,000 has been secured from the Uni- 
ted States for military occupation, and a further sum of 
over $17,000 has been allowed by a board of army officers, 
which there is every reason to expect from the justice of 
congress. The landed property, over 300,000 acres, exclu- 
sive of the college farm, has a value large, but which can- 
not be definitely fixed, 

The average attendance on the various departments of 
the University, for the past four years has been 480 , and 
the income for the current year, including that of the 
School of Mines and Metallurgy, is $63,943.69. In addi- 
tion to this, other economies, which I have not time to 
enumerate, lest I try the patience of my audience — have ac- 
complished an annual saving not less than the amount of 
the President's salary, which is so much practically added 
to the income. 

It ought not to be omitted that this is now the recognized 
and adopted University of the State,provided for by the Con 
stitution, which imposes on the Legislature the duty of 



[33] 
maintaining it with all its departments, as now established; 
and not less a recognized National College, to be furnished 
by the General Government with an army officer to give in- 
struction in military science, and that the Government has 
provided here and at the School of Mines and Metallurgy the 
necessary arms and accoutrements. Nor must we fail to 
note the wisdom of the Constitutional enactment, provid- 
ing for the selection of Curators — thus preventing great 
and violent changes in the governing body, and insuring 
a large degree of permanency and individual responsibili- 
ty in the members of the Board. 

Nor should we overlook the fact that liberal gentlemen 
now desire to connect their names with, and place their 
means at the disposal, of an established and successful in- 
stitution, and to this end provide annual prizes, and make 
valuable donations; soon, let us trust, to be followed by 
the founding of scholarships. 

Such, briefly stated are some of the accomplished facts 
within the ten years of your administration. To estimate 
them at their full value, it must be remembered that some 
of them were years of intense partisan feeling and bitter- 
ness — inevitable' after the close of a great civil convulsion; 
that there was not harmony of opinion between the piople 
among whom the institution was located and the domi- 
nant party in the General Assembly, which often contain- 
ed men who were controlled largely by partisan bias ; and 
that every step had to be won in spite of their violent op- 
position. Nor did this opposition entirely disappear with 
the change of the dominant party. 

Although the results attained sink into insignificance 
when compared with the individual donations, within the 
same time, of a Cornell, a Vanderbilt or a Johns Hopkins, 
yet to those who know the labor and thought and untir- 
ing perseverance which have been needed and used to ac- 
complish them, even thus imperfectly sketched, they are 
amazing. 

Your knowledge of what is due to truth and justice, Mr. 



[34] 
President, would rebuke me if I attempted to attribute all 
these vast results to your individual efforts. No one man 
accomplished them, no one man could have done it. The 
work required a variety of talent and a variety of men — 
information, thought, resources in the study; knowledge 
of men, tact, legislative experience and eloquence in the 
halls of legislation and elsewhere. You had able and willing 
aids — but it was your merit that you drew them to you, and 
trained and furnished them for the conflict ; yourself the 
chief and always in the "fierce light that beats upon" the 
leader. 

My intimate knowledge, arising from our official rela- 
tions, justifies the statement that you educated those around 
you, through whom and with whom you had to work ; ed- 
ucated the successive Boards of Curators up to a proper 
conception of the University idea, furnishing them from 
your fullness of information with facts and arguments 
which the engrossing cares of their lives did not allow 
them otherwise to obtain ; imparting to them something 
of your own energy in the work before them, and inspiring 
them with your own enthusiasm. Ignoring — as aside from 
the life-work to which you had consecrated yourself, and 
from the profession which was your passion — all questions 
which divided the people of the state into sects or parties, 
you "gave yourself wholly" to the work to which you had 
been called, with an ability, a thoroughness of information 
— the result of a lifetime of fond devotion to your profes- 
sion — and a singleness of purpose which challenged admi- 
ration and respect. 

Ever taking care for the University, how its resources 
might be best husbanded, how the greatest results might 
be obtained by the least expenditure, how the resources 
might be increased ; watching over its every interest with- 
in and without the walls ; now devising wise legislation in 
the state, now suggesting and aiding to mould congressional 
legislation, you had but one thought, one absorbing pas- 
sion. Nor was labor in the class-room omitted or neglect- 



[35] 
ed, while yon wer^ employed in preparation of papers and 
reports tending to mould the public mind of the state to an 
appreciation of the value, to every interest, of higher ed- 
ucation. These papers have been commended and their 
ideas adopted from Maine to California. 

Notably is this true of your plan for the organization of 
the University, in which you claim that ours is a christian 
civilization, a christian people, which must have a christian 
University. A motion being made to strike out this lan- 
guage, your purpose to resign at once if the motion prevail- 
ed was expressed in terms as emphatic as they were con- 
clusive of your hearty acceptance of the christian system. 

In conclusion, I submit that the results accomplished 
show your administration to have been eminently success- 
ful, and that the impartial judgment will be that yours was 
a grand work, nobly done. 

Just appreciation, President Laws, of the service of your 
predecessor is the surest guarantee that the services 
which you shall render to the institution of which you are 
about to assume the control, will be neither unobserved nor 
unappreciated. 

Availing yourself with wise thought and practiced 
hand, of the vantage-ground already secured, every friend 
of education — chief of all the Alumni — must expect and 
hope for the University under your administration the am- 
plest measure of growth and success. 

The Alumni would think I had ill represented them, if I 
omitted to pledge to you, in this grand work, their heartiest 
loyalty and most earnest and cordial support. 



ADDRESS 

OF 

LIEUT.-GOV. 1ST. J. OOLMAN 

ON PART OF THE PEOPLE. 

Lieut.-Gov. Colman though suddenly called upon to 
take the place of Governor Hardin, and strongly express- 
ing a sense of the embarrassment of his position in doing 
so, was peculiarly felicitous and pertinent in the remarks 
he made, although they were entirely extemporaneous. 

He spoke of the unparalleled growth of the University, 
as a matter of state pride — of its present broad and secure 
foundations based in the constitution itself — of its different 
colleges or departments of instruction constituting it a 
University in the full sense — of the immense debt of grati- 
tude which the state owed and would forever owe, the re- 
tiring President, Dr. Read, as the master builder in the no- 
ble superstructure and thus a benefactor of the common- 
wealth for all time — he made happy allusion to the struggle 
in the legislature when it was his own proud privilege to 
bear a part as a laborer with the eloquent President of this 
Board, James S. Rollins, in securing legislation which had 
given strength and power to the institution and made it 
what it is. Gov. Colman painted in most vivid contrast the 
external appearance of the University when but a few years 
since he first visited it as a Curator, and the aspect as now 
greeting the eye of the visitor. The change was so great 
as to be almost beyond the power of being fully realized. 

With the illimitable resources of our commonwealth — its 
position in the very centre of our empire of states, in the 
very pathway of inter-oceanic communication — with the 
other duties to which we arc called and other responsibilL- 



[37] , 

ties devolving upon us by the Almighty Creator, in the 
situation in which he has placed us as a people, there is 
not a single one more clearly indicated or more urgent as 
a demand upon us, than the education of the coming gen- 
eration who shall inhabit this region, and the establishment 
of such a system as shall most effectually secure uni- 
versal education to our people, The State University is a 
part of this system under our constitution ; and pride and 
patriotism equally urge us to support and perfect this insti- 
tution, 

He said he felt proud and honored in congratulating the 
new President on his accession to the high office upon 
which be was entering — in welcoming him to the state not 
as a stranger, but as a returning fellow-citizen, and to ten- 
der him his personal and official co-operation in the great 
work of which he is henceforth to be the leader. 



ADDRESS 

9 

OF 

HON. J. S. ROLLINS, 

PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OP CURATORS, ON PART 

OF THE BOARD. 

Gentlemen of the Board of Curators, Ladies and 
Fellow-Citizens : This must ever be regarded as a mem- 
orable day in our country, and in the history of the Uni- 
versity of the State of Missouri. A day that will be more 
generally celebrated, than any other since the nation's 
birth. A day that inspires every true patriot with feel- 
ings of gratitude, and turns our hearts with adoration and 
thankfulness to the Almighty Ruler of the Universe, for the 
blessings which he has vouchsafed to us,of free government, 
of civil and religious liberty, of equal and just laws, of the 
privileges of education, and of social intercourse > and of 
the blessings of peace, comfort and happiness which this 
day attend us as a people. Especially are we thankful to 
the Giver of all good, that in his infinite mercy, he permits 
us this day, this sacred day, to celebrate the hundredth an- 
niversary of our national existence. That we may look back 
oyer the century which now closes, and recount with grat- 
itude and joy, the progress of our great country, in popu- 
lation, in the extent of its geographical boundaries, in its 
physical, moral, social and intellectual development, in the 
improvement and advance made in literature, in the arts 
and sciences, in the facilities and improved modes of educa- 
tion, in discovery and invention, in the rapid inter-commun- 
ication of thought and commercial intercourse, and in all 
those improvements which add to the comfort, the intelli- 
gence, the respectability, the hapiness and greatness of the 
people of the United States. So much is secure. One 



[39] 

hundred years ! Its history is written. It cannot be ob- 
literated. Our national existence, the experiment of free 
government, founded upon the will of the people, compos- 
ed of separate and independent states, has survived a cen- 
tury and is thus far a success. We have passed the period 
of in'ancy and youth, grown into manhood, subdued the 
wilderness, driven back the savage foe, planted the stand- 
ard of christian civilization, where heathenism only was 
hitherto known, withstood the shock of foreign wars, pass- 
ed thro' the bloody scenes of internecine strife, 

"And the grass 
Green from the soil of carnage names alone 
The crushed and mouldering skeleton;" 

crossed over the great rivers, scaled the mountain tops, uni- 
ted the two oceans, and made our country free. What 
next ? We look forward with confidence and hope. We 
ask ourselves : What will another century reveal to the 
generations of men, who are to come after us ? We know 
something of the instability of all earthly things, and how 
perishable are the works of man : 

"Revolutions sweep 
O'er earth, like troubled visions, o'er the breast 
Of dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink 
Like bubbles on the water." 

But the great and wise men who founded our govern- 
ment and institutions, intended that they should last for- 
ever. And perhaps in all the ages, there never was a gov- 
ernment established amongst men, combining so happily 
the best features of the different forms of government, as 
then known, and so well calculated to give strength and 
durability, and expansion, and at the same time to secure 
the largest freedom, to the citizen, as the mixed govern- 
ment of the United States. In the proper observance of 
its letter and spirit, its checks and balances, and its well- 
defined departments moving in their respective orbits, we 
regard it as not only the best, but the strongest govern- 
ment on earth. But in order to perpetuate it, the people 
must have intelligence ; without the general diffusion of 



[4o] 

education amongst them, no free government can exist for 
any great length of time. I need not cite examples. They 
will occur to every mind. They exist all around us. The 
pathway of history is strewn with the wrecks of govern- 
ments, which perished on account of the ignorance and 
immorality of the masses. We must be true to our God- 
appointed mission. We must ever remember that virtue, 
morality, intelligence, education are the solid foundations, 
on which alone, the grand temple of American liberty can 
withstand the test of time. And without intending to pur- 
sue this line of thought (the occasion forbids) I may be 
permitted to express one idea on this patriotic occa- 
sion, and on which more than any other, the perpe- 
tuity of the government of the United States depends. 
I refer to the Unity of the Republic. It is this alone, 
which must give to us our greatest strength, which 
ensures to us while it lasts our true position amongst 
the nations of the earth. It is our country as a whole, and 
not its Federal parts, that commands the homage and ad- 
miration of the world. This was the grand idea which in- 
spired the sages, the heroes and patriots of 1776. It was 
in the midst of the bloody and protracted struggle of the 
Revolutionary war that this lesson was so deeply im- 
pressed upon the great and good Washington. He every- 
where inculcated it upon his countrymen, first, last and 
all the time. And when he had taken off and thrown 
aside the robes of office, still anxious for his country, un- 
willing to leave anything undone that might add to its 
strength, and the happiness of his countrymen, in his last 
parting words to them, he continued,in his Farewell P. ddress. 
to impress upon them the sacredness and importance of- 
the Union. In that matchless paper, which should be 
taught as the first lesson to every child, in everv school, 
in every school district, in every State in the American 
Union, he uses the following eloquent and impressive 
language: 

"The unit}" of government, which constitutes you one people, is 
also, now dear to you. It is justly so: Cor if is a main pillar in the 



[41] 

edifice of your real independence — the support of your tranquility at 
home, your peace abroad, of your safety, of your prosperity, of that 
very liberty which you so highly prize, But as it is easy to foresee that, 
from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be 
taken, man}* artifices employed, to weaken in jour minds the convic- 
tion of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against 
which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most con- 
stantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, 
— it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the im- 
mense value of your national union to your collective and individual 
happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable 
attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as 
of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for 
its preservatian with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may 
suggest even a suspicion that it can, in any event, be abandoned ; and 
indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to 
alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the 
sacred ties which now link together the various parts- 

And this glorious sentiment of the Father of his Country- 
has been cannonized and made doubly precious to every 
patriotic heart, in that beautiful, apostrophe to the Union, 
by one of the most delightful American poets : 

"Thou, too, sail on,0 ship of state ! 
Sail on, 0, Union, strong and great! 
Humanity with all its fears, 
With all the hopes of future years, 
Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 
We know what master laid thy keel, 
What workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, 
Who made each mast and sail and rope, 
What anvils rang, what hammers beat, 
In what a forge and what a heat 
Were shaped the anchors of thy hope ! 
Fear not each sudden sound and shock, 
'Tis of the wave and not the rock ; 
'Tis but the flapping of the sail, 
And not a rent made by the gale ! 
In spite of rock and tempests roar, 
In spite of false lights on the shore, 
Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! 
Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee. 
Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, 
Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, 
Are all with thee, are all with thee!" 



[42]. 

THIRTY-SIXTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE 
UNIVERSITY. 

But we meet to day, fellow-citizens, to celebrate not only 
the Centennial Anniversary of our National Independence, 
but also the Thirty sixth Anniversary of the University of 
the State of Missouri. On the 4th day of July, 1840, be- 
fore many of you who are now listening to me were born, 
in a pleasant grove where this stately building now stands, 
its corner stone was laid. In it was deposited — 

"IT. S. coins — five, ten, twenty-five and fifty cent pieces; a manu- 
script copy of the charter of the University, authenticated by the cer- 
tificates and signatures of the governor and secretary of state and 
the great seal of the state; the names of all the Curators of the Uni- 
versity now in office; a list of the donors to the institution and the 
amount subscribed by each ; the following sentence written in the 
English, French, Latin and Greek languages: 

"This is to commemorate the laying of the corner stone of the prin- 
cipal edifice of the University of the State of Missouri, on the 4th day 
of July in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty;" 
in the 65th year of the independence of the United States of North 
America, and fourth of the administration of Martin Van Buren. Pres- 
ident, and Richard M. Johnson, vice-President, of said United States ; 

'"20th year of the state of Missouri, and fourth of the administration 
of Lilburn W. Boggs, Governor, and Samuel Cannon, Lieut. Governor 
of said State." 

Names of preseut executive officers of state: James L. Minor, 
Secretary of State; S. Mansfield Bay, Attorney General; Hi- 
ram H. Baber, Auditor of Public Accounts, and James McClelland, 
State Treasurer. 

This ceremony was performed in the midst of a large 
concourse of people and in the presence of the Board of 
Curators of the institution, with all due pomp and signifi- 
cance, and an eloquent address delivered by my now venera- 
ble friend and accomplished gentleman, the Hon. James L. 
Minor, of Jefferson City. This ceremony had been pre- 
ceeded by a warm contest between six of the central 
counties of the State, to decide which one should have the 
location of this valuable institution. The people of Boone 
county having subscribed the largest sum to obtain it, and 
having advantages equal to any of her competitors, the 
commissioners appointed under the law decided upon this 



[43] 

place as its permanent location. At the time, it was re- 
garded as a great triumph. Preceeding the existence of 
the State University there had grown up here a small in- 
corporated institution known as "Columbia College," 
and which was at last merged into the University itself. 
At the time of the location of the University in this place, 
the following gentlemen composed the Board of Trustess 
of Columbia College: James Moss, Warren Woodson, 
Moss Prewitt, John B. Gordon, William Cornelius, Robert 
S. Barr, Oliver Parker, Sinclair Kirtley, J. B. Howard, 
Thomas Miller, Thomas M. Allen and James S. Rollins. 
Except one, they were all leading and valuable men in 
this community, and pioneers in the cause of education; 
and to them, I may be permitted to say, the present gen- 
eration owes a debt of gratitude for many of the advanta- 
ges which we are this day enjoying. These men are not 
here now. Their representatives are scattered all over the 
State, and amongst them are numbered many of our best 
citizens. They are all dead, save the humble individual 
who now addresses you. 

"Thus it is 
Like leaves on trees, the race of man is found, 
Now green in youth, now withering in the ground, 
Another race the following spring supplies ; 
They fall successive, and successive rise; 
So generations in the course decay; 
So flourish these, when those have hoped way !' : 
The existence of the University of the State of Missou- 
ri is due primarily to the beneficence of the United States 
Government in making a grant of two townships of land, 
at the time of the admission of Missouri as one of the 
States of the American Union, for the support of a 
seminary of learning. This was in 1820, and afterward to 
the liberality of the people of Boone county, in making a 
subscription of $1 17,900, in money and lands, to secure 
the location of the institution in their midst. The general 
government has been a steady friend to all the new States, 
in aiding in their progress and development. 

She has laid the foundation and furnished the means to 



L 



[44] 

establish and build up a splendid system of common 
schools; a brimming reservoir of living waters, where 
every son and daughter of the State may drink in copious 
drafts of knowledge, "without money and without price." 
She has richly endowed our higher institutions of learning, 
affording a generous culture to the ripened intellect of the 
State. She has aided in building up our benevolent poli- 
cies and fostering our charitable establishments, de- 
manded by our christian civilization for the benefit, of the 
unfortunate of our race. She has laid her powerful hand 
on our great rivers, and commerce in mightier volumes 
courses in safety through these natural arteries of trade. 
She has founded our magnificent system of public works 
by princely grants of the national domain, without which 
the whistle of the locomotive would hardly have been 
heard in our State. She has granted millions of acres of 
swamp lands, for general beneficent uses, in development 
of our physical resources or in further aid of our public 
establishments of education and benevolence. 

The same thing can not be truthfully said of the State, 
so far as this institution of learning is concerned. From 
the time of its location, and for twenty -seven j/^rctherafter, 
not one dollar was ever appropriated by any law of the 
State for the support and maintenance of the University, 
altho' there existed in the State Constitution from the be- 
ginning, a recognition of the institution, and a solemn 
pledge for the "encouragement of education in the State, and 
for the improvement and permanent security of the funds and 
endowments of such institutions" Even the expenses of the 
Board of Curators, instead of being paid out of the com- 
mon -revenues of the 'State, were charged over upon the 
very small and inadequate fund belonging to the University, 
and arising from the sales of seminary lands, granted by 
Congress to this State for the benefit of the institution. 
For these twenty-seven years the University was utterly 

neglected, and it was not until the I ith day of March, 1867, 
that a bill was passed and approved, making an appropria- 



[45] 

tion for the University. Since that time a more liberal 
policy has prevailed, not however without a most painful 
and persevering" effort on the part of a few friends of the 
University to bring the legislative mind up to a reasonable 
standard, in reference to this great interest For almost 
every other interest no such indifference has been manifested. 
Money has been poured out like water for the establish- 
ment of prison houses, to found asylums for lunatics and 
persons of unsound mind, for the blind, and for the deaf 
and dumb; for all these palaces have been built. Millions 
upon millions have been lavished in the building of our 
railroad system. Nor do I complain of these things. It 
evinces the right spirit, and it is all proper for this to have 
been done. But when aid has been asked to "establish and 
maintain" just one higher institution of learning, commensu- 
rate with the wants and wealth of our great State, where 
the sons and daughters of Missouri could enjoy all the 
advantages of education and culture, of moral and intel- 
lectual refinement, and thorough development, to be met 
with in many other States of the Union, their appropria- 
tions and expenditures have been made with a stinted 
hand. For the young men and women of the State, those 
upon whom will soon rest its civilization and character, 
those who are to be the teachers of our children, who are 
to fill the walks of professional life, who are to become 
our well-informed, scientific and practical agriculturists, 
our skilled artizans and mechanics, our law-givers, our 
statesmen, our engineers, our educated miners, our orators, 
our poets and philosophers, these all are left, so far as the 
State is concerned, with a very meagre provision for that 
preparation demanded by the wants of learning and the 
progress of the 19th century. 

We greet here to-day His Excellency, the Governor of 
the State. I am gratified that he is with us on this inter- 
esting occasion, and during these ceremonies. I am glad 
to have the opportunity to call his attention to these facts 
which I have stated. A friend of education and the 'bund- 
er himself of a literary institution bearing his honored 



[46] 

name, he understands and knows how utterly futile the 
effort will prove for the State to build here a great University 
without abundant means. No intelligent man will dispute 
for a moment the legal obligation of the State to meet 
these just demands, so far as this University is concerned. 
From 1820 down to the present time, in every Consti- 
tution under which we have lived, this obligation has been 
solemnly affirmed and re-affirmed. In our present Con- 
stitution, framed only last year, and adopted by a unani- 
mous vote of the members of the Constitutional Conven- 
tion who made it, and ratified by an overwhelming majority 
of the voters of the State at the polls, the same obligation 
coming down thro' more than a half century is imposed 
upon the General Assembly of the State to "aid and 
maintain the State University, now established, with its 
present departments." So that if the Constitution is to 
be of binding effect, if any consequence whatever is to be 
attached to it, if it is not to remain a dead letter in our 
code of laws, the wants of the University must be met 
according to recommendations of its intelligent guardians, 
the nine Curators who are to look after and control its 
business and finances. 

THE UNIVERSITY BELONGS TO THE WHOLE 

PEOPLE. 
This institution belongs to the whole people of the State, 
and its support and maintenance devolve upon them. No 
sect in religion, or party in politics, is to have any prefer- 
ence in its control and management. In the language of 
the very able report presented to this Board of Curators 
at their meeting in December, 1870, and the recommenda- 
tions of which were unanimously adopted, and are now the 
law for the government of the Board, — 

"The University, thus existing by the power of the state, is for the 
benefit of the whole people of the state, and hence mere partisan poli- 
tics and sectarian religion are to be w'lolly ignored and discarded. No 
man is to be accepted or rejected either as president, professor, or 
other emplo} r e of the University, because hebelongs to this or that sect 
or to this or that political party. The University — and, indeed, our 
whole state system of education, sliould be entirely above and beyond 



[47] 

the rivalry of sects, or the ups and downs of political parties. The 
only rivalry which should exist among them, ought to be, which will 
do most in the cause of universal enlightenment. Men who hold the 
high position of president or professors in the State University, ought, 
in the words of the late President Lathrop, to be 'too good patriots to 
be partizans, and too good christians to be sectarians.' ' 

And simply because it is not a denominational school, 
the too common opinion must not *be adopted that there- 
fore it must be irreligious. The absence of sectarian con- 
trol should not be confounded with lack of piety. "A uni- 
versity whose officers and students are divided among many 
sects need no more be irreverent and irreligious than the 
community which, in respect to diversity of creed, it re- 
sembles. It would be a fearful portent if thorough study 
of nature and of man, in all his attributes and works, such 
as befits a university, led scholars to impiety. But it does not; 
on the contrary, such study fills men with humility and awe, 
by bringing them on every hand face to face with unscrut- 
able mystery and infinite power." 

PROFESSORS, ALUMNI, STUDENTS. 

The beginning of another century in the history of the 
Republic, as well as another Anniversary of the University, 
brings with them new duties and obligations to all classes 
of society. The aim ought to be to improve and to per- 
petuate the government under which we live, and to build 
up here in Missouri an educational institution of a high 
order, equal to any to be found anywhere in our broad 
land; an institution where in the language of the founder 
of Cornell University, "any person may receive instruc- 
tion in any study." And to attain this desirable object, 
to whom can the people look, with greater confidence, 
than to the Professors, the Alumni and the Students? 
We need more zeal and energy, and earnest co-operation, 
or the part of all those, who are in any way connected 
with the institution, and who have derived any advantage 
from its associations and instructions. 

A TIMELY SUGGESTION. 

Citizens of Columbia and Boone County : — Your prin- 
cipal claim to the consideration and respect of your fellow 



[48] 

men, and whatever reputation you have abroad, grows 
largely out of the fact, that this is the seat of the State 
University, and other kindred institutions, planted in part 
by your liberality and benificence, and calculated to refine, 
to elevate, and to make you a more cultivated and intelli- 
gent people. Your material prosperity; your social and 
moral standing as a people depend greatly upon the suc- 
cess of these institutions. Hitherto this University has 
been damaged and retarded in consequence of the local 
strifes and animosities, springing up around it. These 
thmgs ought to be discountenanced and frowned out of 
existence, by every decent man and woman in the com- 
munity. Educational institutions cannot grow and pros- 
per except in an atmosphere of peace. And if to quarrel 
and wrangle be a law of your nature, let it be over some- 
thing else than your institutions of learning The good 
suggestion which I am pleased to make is, not to quarrel 
at all ! But if wrangle you must, let it be about your pol- 
itics, your religion, your business, the weather, about any- 
thing, but let not the fatal poison enter and contaminate 
your University and other similar institutions; and let him 
be regarded as a public enemy, who is mean enough and 
base enough to mar the good order, the harmony and the 
success of institutions like these, in order to gratify a per- 
sonal prejudice, or to gain some low advantage by appeal- 
ing to the prejudices of others. The prosperity of these 
institutions, which have cost us so much of time and labor 
and money, is pretty much in your own keeping. You 
can tear them down or build them up. You can invite 
patronage hither, or you can drive it far away. By acting 
the part of wisdom, cultivating a spirit of unity and har- 
mony, and joining with those who are using their best ef- 
forts to promote the public good, you can make them 
prosperous, useful and respectable. 

THE RETIRING PRESIDENT 
This day closes another administration of the State Uni- 
versity. It has been ten years since the distinguished and 



[49] 
venerable educator, who this day retires, was chosen to the 
office of President of the institution. With what earnestness, 
ability and fidelity he has discharged all the duties con- 
nected with the high position, is attested by the growth 
and enlargement of the University in every direction. In 
its increased endowments, the multiplication of its depart- 
ments, and the number of its professors, the growth of its 
library, the addition to its buildings, the quadrupling of 
the number of its students, and the improved facilities and 
advantages of liberal culture, which are now presented to 
the young men and women of Missouri, thro' the medium 
of the State University, Throughout your entire admin- 
istrative term, Sir, you have enjoyed the unqualified res- 
pect and confidence of each Board of Curators, with whom 
you have been associated in the management of the insti- 
tution, and to-day it is my plensure, and I have the honor, 
in the name of the present Board as its President, to pre- 
sent to you the resolutions which I hold, in my hand, 
unanimously adopted during their present meeting : 

RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY THE CURATORS, 
University of the State of Missouri, Columbia, Mo. 

The term for which Dr. Daniel Read was elected to the Paesidency of 
the University of the State of Missouri, being about to expire, and he 
having declined a re-election to the office, the duties of which he has so 
long and so faithfully administered, this Board desiring in some ap- 
propriate manner to testify their appreciation of the great services 
which he has rendered the Institution, as well as the cause of educa- 
tion in Missouri, have passed unanimously the following resolutions: 

1st Resolved, That this Board are impressed with a profound sense 
of the value of the labors, and of the great services which the retiring 
President. Dr. Daniel Read, has rendered this institution i44vee his of- 
ficial connection with it now ten years ago, in building it up. and plac- 
ing it in rank, amongst the first literary and scientific institutions in the 
Mississippi Valley- 

2nd. Having devoted more than a half a century of his life to the 
cause of education, commencing as a Professor, after his graduation 
with the honors of his class at the age of If) in the Ohio State Uni- 
versity, and faithfully serving in similar Universities in the states 
of Indiana and Wisconsin, receiving the commendation and applause 
of the liberal-minded and cultivated men and women of those states, 
and ending at last his successful career as the President of (his insti- 



[50] 

tution, he is entitled to the confidence and enduring gratitude of every 
true friend of the University and of education in Missouri. 

3rd. In the administration of his great office he has omitted no duty, 
but for industry, energy, fidelity and great capabilities, he has set a 
noble example, and won the admiration and esteem of professors, stu- 
dents and curators alike, and he carries with him the best wishes of all 
for his health, prosperity and future happiness. 

4th. That a copy of these resolutions be prepared by the Secretary 
and that they be publicly presented to Dr. Read by the President of 
this Board, on the occasion of his final retirement from office. 
^? r 2y) Attest, with the seal of the University affixed, July 4, 1876. 

JAMES S. ROLLINS, President, 
ROBERT L. TODD, Secretary. 

Since you have been a citizen of Missouri, you have 
strengthened and lifted np the cause of popular and higher 
education, and you have performed a work which will tell 
upon the generations, that are to come after us. The peo- 
ple of Missouri owe to you, Sir, a debt of gratitude which 
they will never be able to repay. And in your long and 
laborious life as a professional educator in the west, in the 
great states of Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin and Missouri, ex- 
tending over a period of more than half a century, you have 
built a monument more lasting than brass or marble, and 
won laurels that can neither wither or fade. Wherever 
you may go, whatever sky may be above you, and what- 
ever fortunes may attend you in after life, you carry with 
you, the sincere respect, the profound gratitude, and the 
best wishes of every member of this Board. 

ADDRESS TO THE INCOMING PRESIDENT. 

I congratulate you, Sir, that you are about to take 
charge of this University, as its chief executive officer, un- 
der so favorable circumstances. At the beginning of the 
second century of our national existence as a people ; and 
just having closed the 36th Anniversary of the University, 
with a reasonably good endowment, respectable buildings, 
the various Literary, Scientific, and Professional depart- 
ments in operation, a Library of well-selected books, and 
in truth with all the appointments promising permanency 



[50 
and growth, me thinks, you have much to encourage and 
inspire you. How different when the faithful and accom- 
plished Lathrop entered upon his career here of useful- 
ness and honor this day 36 years ago. As it were in the 
wilderness, without buildings, without departments, with- 
out professors, without books, without income, without 
students! But he did not falter; — he was not discouraged ; 
having a high and noble purpose, in the vigor of young 
manhood, appreciating aright the dignity and importance 
of his great profession, inspired with courage and with 
faith and hope, he entered willingly upon the great work 
before him. He was faithful to duty; — he did all that 
mortal man could do, with. the means at his command, in 
giving a start, and an impulse to higher education in Mis- 
souri. He was a master builder ; he laid these founda- 
tions ; — he laid them well ; strong enough to uphold any 
superstructure, that his successors may put upon them. 
He wore out his life in the cause of education, and in the 
sublime effort to advance the best interests of his fellow- 
men. How different indeed than when your immediate 
predecessor came upon the ground to begin his labors, 
of which I have already spoken. Our great country just 
emerging from the bloody scenes of intercenine war, — the 
President's house in ashes, — the main building of the Uni- 
versity, having just been occupied as a military barrack, 
the fencing and grounds in a dilapidated condition, with 
but few students, and the finances of the institution greatly 
crippled, and above all the passions of men. maddened by 
civil war, not yet having had time to cool. These had to be 
reconciled, and almost everything had to be replaced, and 
made fresh and new again. Following the example of his 
distinguished predecessor, "with an eye that never winked, 
and a wing that never tired," possessing patience, cour- 
age, energy, confidence, he entered upon his work with 
an able head and a willing heart, and after ten years of 
faithful service, you have the results as you see them, and 

as I have faintly described them. I do not speak so ex- 
tensively of the other Presidents, Shannon, Hudson, 



[52] 

Minor, who have also labored here. They were all good 
and earnest men, and performed their work well, but they 
did not encounter such obstacles as did Lathrop in com- 
mencing the foundations, or Read in taking charge of the 
University, just at the close of a long and bloody civil war. 
You come to us, Sir, when the Angel of Peace" has spread 
his white wings over us, and the public mind is awakened 
upon the great subject of education, when the State is 
willing to lend a helping hand ; when there are means to 
work with, and the material is abundant ; you come to us 
in matured manhood, with a justly high reputation as a 
scholar and teacher; your mind enriched with the treas- 
ures of science and literature, and great professional at- 
tainments, after long years of patient study and labor, un- 
der the most favorable auspices ; you come to us, possess- 
ing the sympathy, the good will, the confidence and res- 
pect of the people of the State. 

When, Sir, the far-reaching issues that are involved in 
the great, trust now to be confided to you, and the influ- 
ence its wise, faithful, and efficient performance is to exert 
upon the country and the world, are measured and under- 
stood ; when we reflect that we indulge but a reasonable 
hope, in looking forward from your period of life, that, 
through this day's proceedings your hand will be instru- 
mental in leading the minds and moulding the characters 
of a larger number of the best youth of the country than 

were guided by any of your predecessors, — it is no exag- 
geration to say, that this ceremony surpasses in interest 
and importance any that accompanies the investiture of 
Ruler or Magistrate with the function of civil government, 
however imposing or significant they may be. The house 
is far from being finished : the beautiful tree has not yet 
attained its growth : there is yet work to be done ; the 
field is before you, the grain is ripening for the sickle, go 
in with your co-laborers, gather and enjoy it. 

Fully investing you with the insignia of the high office 
to which you have been called, and earnestly tendering 
to you, the warmest sympathies, and ready co-opera- 
tion of the Board of Curators, I now in their name, greet 
you as President of the University of the State of Missouri. 



OF 

SAMUEL S. LAWS, LL. D, 
president of the state university. 

Mr. President of the Board of Curators— Ladies 
and Gentlemen: — The clock has struck the hour for my 
entrance upon official duty as President of the University 
of the State of Missouri. The utterances of leave-taking- 
on this occasion have invoked, unbidden, a pensive and 
reflective mood. 

Your parting words, my venerable predecessor, [address- 
ing Dr. Read,] have called forth from the secret chambers 
of memory the thoughtful lines of one of our Southern 

poets: 

Alone I walked the ocean strand ; 

A pearly shell was in my hand: 
I stooped and wrote npon the sand 

My name, the year and day; — 
As onward from the spot I passed 
One lingering look behind I cast, — 
A wave came rolling high and fast 

And washed my lines away. 
And so, methought, 'twill quickly be 
With every mark on earth from me : 
A wave of dark oblivion's sea, 

Will sweep across the place 
Where I have trod the sandy shore 

Of time, and been to be no more — 
Of me, my day, the name I bore, 

To leave no track nor trace. 

And yet, with Him who counts the sands, 
And holds the water in His hands, 

I know a lasting record stands 
Inscribed against my name, 

Of all this mortal part has wrought. 

Of all this thinking soul has thought, 

And from these fleeting moments caught, 
For glory or for shame. (*) 



(*) A name in the Sand— Geo. D. Prentice. 



[54] 

And alongside of these melancholy verses steps the 
more hopeful but less truthful stanza of the Psalm of Life 
by the most distinguished poet of the North — 

The lives of great men all remind us 

We can make our lives sublime, 
And, departing, leave behind us 

Footprints on the sands of time — 
Footprints that, perhaps, another 

Traveling o'er life's solemn main, 
A shipwrecked and forlorn brother 

Seeing, shall take heart again. (*) 

The individuals who have left lasting footprints on the 
sands of time are the exceptions. There are very few of 
us who do not write our names in the dust which a quick- 
ly succeeding puff of wind scatters irrecoverably in the 
abysses of oblivion. And whilst life lasts it is allotted us 
to share and share alike of its ills. Each soul knows 
its own troubles as it knows no other's. When a 
boy I read somewhere a myth which related that Jupiter 
became exceedingly impatient of the ccomplaints of 
mortals that their afflictions were unequal, and finally is- 
sued a decree that on a certain day all should assemble at 
a certain plaee that some relief might be afforded. Each 
came with his trouble in a sack, and when all had con- 
vened they were ordered to tumble their sacks into a com- 
• mon heap. This done, then the word issued from the 
throne that as the ills complained of had to remain in the 
world, the only relief practicable was in a re-distribution 



(* "The idea of being educated to fill an humble office in life is hardly 
thought of, and every bumpkin who has a memory sufficient for the words re- 
peats the stanza— 

' 'Lives of great men, " &c. 

There is a fine ring in this familiar quotation of Mr. Longfellow, but. it is nothing: 
more than a musical cheat. It sounds like truth, but it is a lie. The lives of all 
great men remind us that they have made their own memory sublime, but they 
do not assure us at all that we can leave footprints like theirs behind us. ' ' 

"The offices of life are mainly humble, requiring only humble powers for 
their fulfillment. The cemeteries of one hundred years hence will be like those 
of to-day. Of all those now in schools of this country, dreaming of fame, not 
one in 20,000 will be heard of then — not one in 20, 0')0 will have left a footprint 
behind him. * * A school in order to be a good one should be one thatwill fitmen 
and women in the best way for the humble positions that the great mass of them 
must necessarily occupy in life. The greed and scramble for office — the debasing 
practices to secure distinction — and those that succeed are too often mere ' 'no- 
bodies" going through a forcing process to become "somebodies." I insist on 
this: That private and even obscure life is the normal condition of the great 
multitude of men and Avomen in this world; and that to serve private life, pub- 
lic life is instituted . Public life has no significance, save as it is related to the 
service of private life. It requires peeuliar talents and education, and brings 
with it peculiar trials; the man best fitted for it Avould bo the last man confi- 
dently to assert his fitness for it. ' '—Timothy Titcojiv. . 



[55] 
of them, and hence that each should now steo forward 
and take his chances as to the bundle he should snatch 
from the heap and carry home with him. Without excep- 
tion, all joined in a most devout prayer that they might 
severally be permitted to take back what each one brought. 
I know not, sir, that on this occasion I have any right 
as I certainly have no disposition to claim an advantage 
over you except in two particulars, viz : One is in the 
more favorable circumstances under which I enter upon 
my official work ; and the other is in being twenty years 
your junior in age. 

A few days ago, in the southeastern room of the Me- 
morial building on the Centennial grounds, I gazed with 
curious interest upon some specimens of amber sent 
thither from an European collection, which had caught 
and embalmed various insects perhaps for thousands of 
years, so perfectly that the eye unaided by glasses seemed 
to be looking upon the living animals. When my course 
here is finished, as in the natural, if not in the constrained, 
course of events, it must be at no very distant day, I could 
covet no more friendly chroniclers than those who have 
on this occasion, actuated doubtless by a keen sense of 
historic justice, embalmed for the future ages the admin- 
istration of my predecessor. 

For the kindly words which have to-day welcom- 
ed and congratulated me and given me the public 
assurance of a hearty co-operation from the Curators of 
the University, from my colleagues in the Faculty, from 
the Alumni of this University, and last but not least for 
the encouraging pledges from our distinguished fellow- 
citizen, the Lieutenant Governor of this Commonwealth, 
of a like support from the public at large, and for the 
uniformly friendly interest manifested by the public press 
of all complexions of opinion, as well as for numerous 
private expressions of the most friendly personal character, 
for all these public and private official and individual 
tokens of favorable regard, I do now wish to express my 



[56] 

full appreciation and most sincere thanks. The work is 
not mine but yours, and within the sphere of my allotted 
and assumed duties, I am your truly and very humble 
servant. 

There are several things connected with my election to 
this position and acceptance of the same which may prop- 
erly, perhaps ought to be mentioned here and now : 

I. There may be no virtue in the circumstance, but it 
is not out of place to state that I did not seek this position 
either directly or indirectly. The place sought my services 
without suggestion or solicitation on my part; and no 
communication ever passed from me to the Curators, 
individually or collectively, except in courteous response 
to official request or formal action, challenging my atten- 
tion. I mention this, not in any boastful spirit, but only 
because the fact is perhaps worthy of note in view of the 
place-seeking of the age which cannot be regarded 
otherwise than as one of its worst features. This disclaim- 
er is at least an exemption from a general reprobation. It 
also enables me to state that I enter upon my duties with 
no enmities to appease, with no personal obligations 
incurred, and with no personal nor private ends in view 
which might in any direction swerve, one in even the most 
exalted trust from an impartial discharge of duty. I stand 
before you this day, and before the two millions of citizens 
composing the Commonwealth of Misssouri whose educa- 
tional interests center in this Unniversity, curious and 
anxious only as to whether reasonable hopes shall be 
mutually realized. 

2. When the choice was made by the Curators of an 
incumbent of this honerable and responsible position, the 
entire list of distinguished names which a committee of 
inquiry had placed before that body, was freely canvassed; 
after which the first ballot singled out my name by an 
unanimous vote. I mention this with some satisfaction as 
all parties concerned were treated considerately and no 
one's claims were slurred or ignored. The public and 



[57] 
private expressions of approval of the choice made thus 
far given, so far as I know or can learn from the best 
informed, have been without a discordant note. When it 
is remembered that I am no stranger to the citizens of this 
community and state, this circumstance will naturally be 
seen to have a noticeable significance. I freely confess 
that it has greatly influenced my conclusion to accept this 
appointment. Gentlemen of the Board of Curators, I 
have deferred to your judgment with the public as your 
endorsers. It is, therefore, with a cheerful hopefulness 
that I resume my residence in this state amongst known 
and tried friends, and pick up the thread of my life-work 
as an educator which was, some fifteen years since, by 
untoward circumstances, snatched from my grasp. 

3. The third incidental circumstance of immediate 
pertinence to which attention is asked, relates to the 
customary appointment of the President of this University 
for a term of four years, the Professors holding from year 
to year. I declined to accept for a term of years, and 
have explicitly reserved to myself the right to resign at 
my own option. Not to- speak of a possible constraint or 
liability to action for damage, which under certain contin- 
gencies might occur, it is enough to state that the contin- 
uance of official relations in our literary institutions, at the 
discretion of the parties concerned, seems to me to imply 
a spirit of confidence and efficiency of which the more 
mechanical arrangement of term appointments is only too 
liable to be deficient. But the experience of my predecess- 
ors in this position nearly forty for years,some of whom have 
been men eminent for ability and active faithfulness and 
energy, forbids that I should entertain other than chastened 
anticipations of the future, however cloudless its sky may 
now appear to the public gaze and admonishes me not to 
be too sanguine of exemption from censure undeserved or 
from criticism as severe and Unkind as it may be injudi- 
cious and unwise. Are there not even now ominous utter- 
ances buzzing in our ears? With what artless simplicity 
we persuade ourselves that the storm may have exhausted 



[58] 

itself and that the lightning may not strike again where it 
has so often struck, at least for the few years of a single 
administration. How simple minded is hope ; how trust- 
ing and unsuspicious is the heartfelt desire of usefulness! 
It is fully understood, however, that this is a public in- 
stitution and a sacred trust of the entire state; no one of 
its departments is entitled to a toleration of incompetence, 
of inefficiency or of a lack of fidelity. Let the interests of the 
institution and of the cause of public education stand here 
above every other. The University is not for the Curators 
nor for the Faculty, but they are for it. It is the end and 
all else is the means. 

It is related of a venerable and distinguished president of 
one of our eastern colleges that it was expected ofhim,espec- 
ially by the Alumni of the institution,that he would resign on 
completing the fiftieth year of his presidency and give place 
to a younger man. The venerable president however, did 
not view the matter in that light, and, to the disappoint- 
ment of this expectation, he continued to hold over for 
several years. At last, it chanced that at an Alumni dinner,a 
mischievous graduate who greatly revered his president 
must have had his veneration over mastered by a desire 
for a change in the presidency of the institution when he of- 
fered the following toast : "To Dr. our beloved and 

venerated president." He then recited his scholarly and 
personal qualities of excellence and the fidelity, efficiency 
and success of his long service to the institution and wound 
up his summary by saying — "A man who, in short, pos- 
sesses every scholarly, gentlemanly and christian grace 
except the grace of resignation." 

In the reservation which I have made of the right to re- 
tire from this position at my own option, I hope to keep alive 
and in sufficient vigor for actual exercise this much neg- 
lected grace of resignation, should my service fail to meet 
the demands of the position and of the public expectation. 
"Rut do not misunderstand this as implying that I shall 
timidly or cravenly shrink from any incumbent duty or 



[59] 

run away from any needed defense of the truth and of the 
right in the interest of education. 

4. The 4th thing which I wish now to mention is this : 
By law the government and control of this University are 
lodged in the Board of Curators. The Curators have 
lodged the exercise of government and discipline in the 
Faculty. In my acceptance it is made a condition and by 
the explicit acquiescence therein by the Board it has be- 
come an agreement that there is to be no appeal by stu- 
dents from any action of government or discipline on the 
part of the Faculty to the Curators. If the Faculty as a 
body, is incompetent for the work assigned to it, of gov- 
ernment and discipline as well as of teaching, then clear 
the decks and man the vessel with a crew that understands 
and can be trusted to perform its duties. This is the ac- 
cepted and existing state of things. I am pleased that it 
is so. The Curators are thereby wisely exempted from a 
needless and incompetent responsibility, and nothing un- 
reasonable is devolved upon or demanded of the Faculty. 

This point lifts to view the whole subject of college gov- 
ernment which is conceded to be one of great delicacy and 
difficulty. It is not meant to go into that subject at this 
time,farther than simply to enunciate the general principle 
which seems to underlie aad to pervade it, and by a proper 
appreciation of which we probably have one of the best 
guarantees of efficiency and harmony. 

This matter of college government is esteemed the 
approbrium of our higher institutions of learning, and yet 
there does not appear to be any good reason why, if the 
students and authorities of a college understand themselves 
clearly, there should be any trouble. It is conceived that 
there is a principle which presides over this subject and 
that it is obvious on enunciation and all-comprehensive in 
its application. That principle is simply this — The author- 
ity of government in a school is not derived pom the pupils 
nor is it dependent on them in any sense zvhatever. This 
holds true whether it be a private school or a public school; 
an academy, a college,«or a university. In no case is the 



[6o] 

authority of the schoolmaster derived from his pupils. In 
the private school it is an extension of parental authority ; 
in the public schools of all grades, including the university, 
it is an extension of the authority of the state. But in no 
case is the authority of the school house derived from the 
scholars. It does not come up from them,' but it comes down 
upon them. It is not from below; it is from above. Scholars, 
then, do not come to a school to govern it, nor to take any 
part in its government : They come to obey and to be gov- 
erned by submitting to the rules and regulations which 
they find in force, A proper understanding of this very 
simple and comprehensive principle of action takes all the 
windy conceit and swollen importance out of the self-con- 
stituted leaders of college broils and rebellions. The only 
alternative to a pupil in school is to obey or to leave, will- 
ingly or by constraint. 

Any other theory works its own inevitable destruction. 
Take the popular but utterly fallacious and pernicious al- 
ternative that young gentlemen in an institution of learn- 
ing are to be thrown upon and guided by a sense of honor. 
The question at once arises, whose sense of honor ? Is 
each to be a law to himself? Hardly any two in many 
cases can be expected to agree, Most flagrant misbehav- 
ior not unfrequently has the sanction of the guilty party's 
sense of honor. By the operation of this principle, every 
one would do that which was right in his own eyes, which 
is a natural description of a state of barbarous anarchy. 
Between the loyal and orderly subordination of the pupils 
to the constituted authorities of the school-house and the 
lawless and disgraceful subordination of a Faculty to their 
own scholars, no sound, well-informed and unprejudiced 
judgment can hesitate in its choice for a moment. What- 
ever the college or the school -house laws, they are entitled 
to vindication by enforcement till altered or repealed by 
the proper authorities in a proper way. The school in its 
organization and operation is not a democracy, nor a 
republic, any more than is the family. The authority in 
the family does not come from the children. To recognize 



[6i] 

the children as the source of power or the governing 
authority in the family would destroy the household. Any 
other view tends to breed anarchy and lawlessness ; and 
that, too, not only in school days but in the after life of 
pupils as citizens. "The heir, as long- as he is a child, 
differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all ; 
| but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed 
of the father." 

In its measure, this enunciation holds good of the pro- 
fessional schools just the same as of the undergaduate 
schools. Underneath all their freedom of personal action 
and exemption from surveillance, there are certain estab- 
lished rules which are not established nor changed at their 
bidding, and to which the professional or proper Univer- 
sity students must conform, as a condition of pupilage and 
recognition. It may be truly said of them as of the 
contestants in the Grecian games — "If a man also strive 
for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive 
lawfully." A student is not entitled to the benefits nor to 
any of the honors of an institution of learning, except 
upon the condition of loyal compliance with its require- 
ments. 

5. In the fifth place : No changes are to be made in 
the Faculty without the knowledge and approval of the 
President of the University. This was also a condition of 
acceptance. The importance of this provision arises from 
the present organization of the Faculty. By the action of 
the Curators, the President of the University is made and 
held "responsible for organizing and conducting an admin- 
istration." That is the condition of things found in exist- 
ence here. Well, it is a sound axiom that responsibility 
and power must be proportioned. The constitution and 
changes of the Faculty of the University are made admin- 
istrative in character. Let it be understood, however, 
that I am not wedded nor even partial to this style of 
organization; and that, without indicating particulars or 
alt:rnatives, I hasten to say that the Curators can 



[62] 

feel themselves perfectly free to count on my cordial 
co-operation in effecting any transformations in this respect 
which may commend themselves to their mature reflection. 

Being here myself in the capacity of a teacher, I should 
hope that I could not possibly be insensible to the sacrcd- 
ness of the teacher's character and reputation as ordinarily 
constituting the capital on which the well-being of his 
family depends. Any incumbent of a chair knows or 
ought to know, just as well as others do, whether he is 
meeting the wants which his appointment was meant to 
supply. And if not attaining the success contemplated, 
why not exercise that neglected grace of resignation, to 
which reference has already been made, without waiting 
for a hint by toast or otherwise ? If a student is found 
not doing his allotted work, there should be no hesitation 
in inviting him to try it elsewhere, and not to await some 
act of authority, So of a Faculty: When it becomes 
evident that the requirements of a chair are not met, 
fidelity and perfect frankness should govern our inter- 
course. I would scorn to intimate a rule of action as 
applicable to others from whose application I myself 
would shrink. Max Muller resigned his Professorship at 
Oxford, England, to give place to a younger man ; Kingsly 
resigned from the same University because he felt incom- 
petent. President Woolsy resigned from Yale, and Presi- 
dent Hopkins from Williams College, because of age and 
by anticipating the inevitable, retained the favor which is 
now the foundation of great usefulness even at the former 
seats of their labors. 

6. The sixth and final point that I had in mind when 
this line of reflection was entered upon, leads to some 
remarks, in. which the University and the public are 
mutually interested./ In the work of education, in the 
State of Missouri as elsewhere, it is impossible to ignore 
the subject of religion. The i.-nly alternative left open to 
us is not that of having no policy but only that of shaping 
a policy respecting it ; and in doing so it is, perhaps, in the 



[63] 

unsettled state of the public mind, impracticable to 

command more than a general assent. And as a universal 

accordance of opinion on this subject is visionary, abundant 

occasion arises for the exercise of generous forbearance 

and liberality. 

In the light of these general observations, the point to 

which attention is asked is the double complaint made 
against our State University as, on the one hand, having 
in it too little religion ; and, on the other, as having too 
much. Our case is not peculiar, nor is the imputation 
novel, especially in its first form which launches against 
the University of the State of Missouri the charge of incom- 
petence as an educator because of being Godless and 
infidel. This cry has been and is even now effective in 
weakening public confidence, producing distrust and 
diverting patronage. A matter of such grave import 
challenges a calm and judicious consideration ; and a 
review of either phase of this complaint must necessarily 
hold in contemplation both of its phases. 

The criterion by which to test this complaint must be 
found in the practical import of the following provisions 
of the law respecting the University. It is provided in 
the new Constitution (*) as had previously been done by 
law, that "The government of the State University shall 
be vested in a Board of Curators, * * appointed by the 
Governor, by and with the advice of the Senate." h\ the 
exercise of this governmental function, it is provided by 
statute that "The Curators shall have power to appoint the 
President, Professors and Tutors of the University, no one 
of whom shall preach or exercise the functions of a 
minister of the gospel or of any one of the learned 
professions during his continuance in office, (t) This law 
took effect July 4th, 1856. 

(*) Art. XI. \ 5. 



(t) 18.")."), Rev. Stat. State l". §41. A Statute teu years previous (+) had enacted 
that ''The Curators are authorized to appoint the necessary Professors and 
Tutors of the Univei - sity, no one of whom shall exercise the" functions of anj 
oilier profession during his continuance'in office., and to lix their compensation 
and terms of office. " In another section (§'2l) of the same ad it is also provided 
thai "The Curators shall have power, whenever they shall deem it e\pedieut, 
to appoint a President of the University and to presenile, by ordinance, hid 



C«4] 
This provision of the law has been hastily taken to mean 
that ministers of the gospel are, as a class, either proscribed 
from the Faculty of the University, or wholly silenced as 
ministers whilst in it; and hence the conclusion that the 
christian religion is proscribed by the proscription of its 
ministry. As this is a law for the execution of which the 
Curators stand -responsible before the public and on which 
there should be a good understanding, their own declara- 
tions and actual practice are of primary value in disclosing 
to our view the real truth in this case. The understanding 
of this law avowed by the Curators and their unchallenged 
practice under it, give us a practical criterion of judgment 
as to its true meaning and working sense. The following 
is the oft-published declaration of the Curators, and to it 
attention is asked, viz: "The manifest object of this 
provision is to secure a Bonrd of Instruction for the 
University who shall be professional teachers, and devoted 
to their profession as such ; and not men belonging to 
some other profession and exercising its duties." In view 
of this explanatory utterance and of the known practice 
of the Curators in accordance therewith for twenty years* 
the following language was used by me in response to a 
communication of an official character from that body : 

"If the practice under the law is a proper criterion of the 
interpretation put upon it, then I do not see that this law need lie an}" 
barrier between us. The restrictions respecting the exercise of the 
functions of any one of the learned professions apply equal]}" and 
with the same substantial reasons, I presume, to all your appointments. 
The learned professions, of which the gospel ministry is one, are for 
the purposes of this law all placed on a dead level. The principle 
underlying the case would then seem plainly to be this : that the 
claims of the University upon those who hold appointments in it are 
primary and paramount. Should any such appointee by any 
occupation, such as preaching or attending to church" matters, 
practicing law or medicine, or other occupation, subordinate his 
University appointment to private or other ends, this would plainly 
disqualify him for bis position and bar him from it. and also forfeit 
his right to compensation during the time of such unfaithfulness. 



term of officii and the powers and duties thereof, in cases not herein provided 
for, and to Itx. his compensation, to be paid out of the income of the Seminary 
fund." 

(+) lS-r>. Chap. 171, Shite I'. Art. •_>, §23&§21. 



[65] 

If this is the sense of the law then it would seem to be rational and 
reasonable. Besides, the practice of the Curators under this law would 
seem to accord with this view. I have not the detailed information 
which would enable me to speak with positiveness, hut the present 
faculty seems plainly to embrace a number of lawyers and physicians 
who exercise sonic of the functions of their learned professions^*) but of 
course not in a, way incompatible with their University duties, of which 
your honorable board must be the judge, unless a case that might 
arise should come before the courts'. If the evidence be not positive 
and controlling, perhaps it might be said, if it be not ruled, the pre- 
sumption is violent that the restrictive statute applies impartially to a 
minister of the gospel in the same general scuse as to any one of the 
other learned professions. 

Said Thomas Jefferson : "Fellow citizens, it is proper you should 
understand what I deem the essential principle of government. 
Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or pursuasion, 
religious or political." A statute can not. without a constraining reason, 
be loaded with the odious and wrongful intent of applying a religious 
test to a state officer, and of offensively discriminating against the 
religion of the citizens of the state by proscribing it in the persons of 
its ministers. An interpretation that favors protection should prevail 
over one that is tantamount to proscription. * 

"My experience tells me that teaching is not incompatible with 
preaching occasionally, but that on the contrary it is a help to it and 
is helped by it, and I am perfectlj* sure that any man who bears the 
name of a minister of the gospel who should accept your presidency 
at the cost of being silenced from his ministry, would thereby forfeit 
all claim to your confidence and respect. Insidious proselyting and 
fanatical bigotry are much more likely to be found under the loose 
garb of pretended indifference than in the man who is outspoken and 
open before the public with his convictions and sentiments, as such 
an one deceives and misleads nobody. Why, we shall never all think- 
alike in this world in matters of either church or state, and Milton 
even represents the saints in Heaven as occupied on its hillsides and 
planes in discussing knotty points on which they differ in a saintly 
way even there. 

Within these twenty years, I know of only two instances 
in which ministers were elected to chairs in the University 
and assigned this law as the reason for not accepting them. 
However, this was only their individual adverse interpre- 
tation for which the Curators were not responsible. 

(*) • This impression is correct. Out of a corps of about thirty instructors in 
the severa: faculties there are, including- the President, three ministers, aid 
a greater number of each of the other learned professions. Account is 
taken only of their faithful discharge of University duty; beyoml that, they arc 
freemen . 



[66] 

As a matter of fact, it is a part of the history of this 
University, which is entitled to recognition by the public, 
that a proscriptive course has not been pursued ; and, as 
actions speak louder than words, the actual practice of the 
Board of Curators demonstrates that hostility to the 
prevailing religious sentiment of the community for which 
the University is established, does not exist in their body, 
and that odium, on that account, does not righteously 
attach to the University. It is due to the interest that the 
public has in truth and justice that this undisguised 
utterance should be made. I am a party to no disguises, 
nor concealments touching this matter. 

My fellow-citizens, it is your work, not as a miscellaneous 
throng nor as this or that town-community, but as an organ- 
ized state, in which we are here engaged, and it is incumbent 
that the utmost candor should be observed so as to leave 
no occasion for misunderstandings, We do not shrink 
from, we invite scrutiny. It is also proper to state that, 
should any one feel aggrieved by this state of the case and 
choose to make an issue over it before the courts, so far at 
least as I am concerned, every facility will be afforded for 
doing so. If opposition is to be made on this account, this 
is the manly way to do it ; and with this understanding, there 
is no occasion left, nor provocation given for irresponsible 
carping and fault-finding. If the law does not mean just 
what the practice of the Curators and Faculty have inter- 
preted it to mean, the courts are open and competent to 
decide the issue. 

Do not misunderstand me. I do not plead nor inti- 
mate any special concession by the Board in my in- 
dividual case. They simply elected me . to this posi- 
tion with the knowledge that I belonged to " one of the 
learned professions " — that I was " a minister of the gospel." 
They imposed no restrictions and exacted no special con- 
ditions, but merely acted under the law. Their avowed 
understanding of the purpose of the law and their practice 
in administering the affairs of the University during the 



[67] 

izo years that this law has been in operation, assume that the 
learned professions are on a level under it, and that Presi- 
dent, Professors and Tutors are equally affected by it. A 
Doctor in Medicine, if President of the University, would, 
by prescribing a dose of physic to a sick servant or by am- 
putating a limb, stand in the same relation to the law as a 
preacher in performing- a marriage ceremony, baptising a 
child or in performing the funeral rites of a deceased collegi- 
an. But the very moment that attention is fixed on the broad 
fact that the doctor, the divine, and the lawyer are placed 
by the law on the same footing, the sense of the law, which 
is the law itself, becomes transparent, and the supposed 
foundation for the complaint and discontent in question 
vanishes. 

There is probably not a University in this or in any other 
land whose Faculties do not embrace members of the learned 
professions who perform acts in the line of those professions 
without making them their distinctive vocations. Indeed, 
it would be not only exceedingly undesirable that the Uni- 
versity professors should be isolated from the profes- 
sions, but it would render the successful management of 
many of these institutions impracticable. Teaching is 
itself a profession, but it is more cosmopolitan or generic 
and less specific or exclusive, than any other. It is 
observable that in the restrictive statute under notice, 
teaching is not contemplated as "one of the learned 
professions.'' 

In England, Lord Hale, who cannot be suspected of 
bigotry, "declared Christianity a part of the Common Law 
of the land," The English Common Law is ours except 
to the extent that constitutions, statutes and court 
decisions may have contravened it. Daniel Webster, an 
authority in Constitutional and Common Law, declares 
in the noted Girard Will case, that Christianity is part of 
the Common Law of this land. It is in that case that 
Mr. Webster uses the following emphatic and eloquent 
language : 

"There is nothing that we look for [in court decisions, acts of 



[68] 

legislatures and public sentiment] with more certainty than this 
general principle: That Christianity is part of* the law of the land. 
The dead proclaim it as well as the living. The generations that are 
gone before speak to it and pronounce it from the tomb. We feel it- 
All, all proclaim that Christianity, general, tolerant Christianity, 
Christian^ independent of sects and parties — that Christianity 
to which the sword and fagot are unknown, general, tolerant Chris- 
tianity, is the law of the land.'' 

The court, in sustaining the will of Mr. Girard vs. Mr. 
Webster's argument, did not deny but conceded this his 
principal and major premis and denied its application to 
the case in question. (*) It is, however, only in a general 
and popular sense that this position is admissible. Un- 



(*) Stephen Girard was born in Bordeaux, France, 17.10, and died 1831, aged 
81 years. He was the son of a sea-captain and also followed the sea. lie 
became a merchant and banker in the cit\ of Philadelphia and a naturalized 
citizen of the United States. 

His fortune, which amounted to about $7,500,000 dollars, was disposed of in 
such in inner that: For tin? erection and endowment of his College, he gave 
2,000,000 dollars; besides certain residues and a line plot of ground in the 
city of Philadelphia on which the present magnificent marble edifice now 
stands. His college was for "poor white male orphan" children to be 
there maintained .and educated according to the provisions in the will and 
under such others as the "mayor and aldermen and citizens of Philadelphia 
may lawfully ordain under the said will." To be qualified for admission, or- 
phans must be between the ages of six and ten years, preference being given, 
first to those born in Philadelphia; next in Pennsylvania, then in the city of 
New York, and last in ]S"ew Orleans. Those scholars who may merit it, remain 
in the college till between 14 and 18, at the discretion of the Board, when they 
are indentured to learn some suitable occupation or trade, until they become 
twenty-one years of age, consulting as far as judicious the inclination and 
preference of the scholar. 

The immediate direction and government of the college is vested in the Presi- 
dent. The Faculty of Instruction and Discipline and the employes are under 
his sole control . There are 100 pupils arranged in graded classes. 

"At the daily and Sunday religious exercises, the President or some other lav- 
man selected by him, officiates, as, by the will, clergymen are not privileged to 
be admitted into the college. On week-days, the chapel exercises consist of 
singing a- hymn, reading a chapter from the Bible, and prayer. On Sundays, 
in addition, an appropriate discourse is delivered." 

The bigoted clause of the will of Mr. Girard, on account of which an attempt 
was made to break it, is the following: 

"I enjoin and require that no ecelesistie, missionary, or minister of any sect 
whatsoever, shall ever hold or exercise any station or duty whatever in the said 
college; nor shall any such person ever be admitted for any purpose, or as a 
visitor, within the premises appropriated to the purposes of the said college: — 
In making this restriction, I do not mean to cast any reflection upon any sect or 
person whatsoever; but as there is such a multitude of sects, and such a diver- 
sity of opinion amongst them, I desire to keep the tender minds of the orphans 
who are to derive advantage from this bequest, free from the excitement which 
clashing doctrines and sectarian cont roversy are so apt lo produce; my desire is, 
that all the instructors and teachers in the college, shall lake pains to instil into 
the minds of the scholars, the purest principles oi morality, so that, on their 
entrance into active life, they may from inclination and habit, evince benevo- 
lence toward their fellow creatures', and a love of truth, sobriety, ami industry , 
adopting at the same time, such religious tenets as their matured reason may 
enable them to prefer ' ' 

Mr. Webster's argument, did not break the will but it did act as an antidote to 
its virus. The Bible, as containing ''the purest principles of morality , " luis 
been an open book in this college from the beginning. As lo '"visitors," no 
inquisition is ever made respecting (heir (doth. ' ' What is the difl'eience, ' ' says 
Mr. Webster, "between unlettered laymen and lettered clergymen in this 
respect? Is not the teaching of laymen as sectarian as the preaching of clergy- 
men? Every one knows that laymen arc as violent controversialists as clergy- 
men, and the less informed, the more viol?ni So this, while if i< :i little more 
ridiculous, is equally obnoxious. Nothing is more apt to be positive and dog- 
matical than ignorance." 



[6 9 ] 
doubtedly the dominant sentiment of the public mind in 
this land, overwhelmingly accords to the Christian religion 
its claims to be a pure and exalted system of worship and 
morals. Its fundamental teaching that there is oivc God 
of whose moral government we are subjects, endowed 
with personal immortality and a responsibility on the scale 
of that immortality — these thoughts are embedded in our 
civilization. Every oath or affirmation to elicit the truth 
in vindication of the rights of property, life and character, 
pre-supposes these ideas as living and opertive truths 
abiding still in our minds and hearts as the descendants of 
those who, a century ago, made the declaration of our 
national and political independence, ''appealing to the 
Judge of all the earth for the rectitude of their intentions." 
With reason, therefore, do we affirm of Christianity that 
its impress is stamped upon our origin, our institutions 
and character. (*) Its entire abstraction from state alliance 
only enshrines it the more sacredly in the hearts of the 
masses and vests it with a spiritual control that is mightier 
than the coercion of the sceptre or the sword. 

The most general conception that we can form of the 
intelligent aim of any people in its system of education, 
is that of the transmission of its civilization. Our civiliz- 
ation is indisputably imbued with Christian influences, and 
naturally enough the public has a right to claim that the 
Public School system, founded in their supreme interest 



(*) "At ihe meeting of the lirst continental congress, there was doubt in the 
minds of many of the propriety of opening the session with prayer; and t he rea- 
son assigned was, as here, thegreat diversity of opinion and religious belief. 
At length Mr. Samuel Adams with his gray hair hanging about his shoulders, 
and with an impressive venerableness now seldom to be met with — I suppose 
owing to the difference of habits — arose in that assembly, and, with the air of a 
perfect Puritan , said that it did not become men, professing to be christain men, 
who had come together for a solemn deliberation in the hour of their ex- 
tremity, to say that there was so wide a difference in their religious belief, that 
they could not, as one man, bow the knee in prayer to the Almighty, whose ad- 
vice and assistance they hoped to obtain . Independent as he was and an enemy 
to all prelacy , as he was known to be, he moved that the Rev. Mr. Duche, of 
the Episcopal church, should address the throne of grace in prayer. And John 
Adams in a letter to his wife, says that he never saw a more moving spectacle . 
Mr. Duche read the Episcopal service of the church of England, and then, as if 
moved by the occasion, he broke out into extemporaneous prayer. And those 
men, who were then about to resort to force to obtain their right. , were moved 
to tears; and floods of tears, Mr. Adams says, ran down the cheeks of the pacific 
Quakers who formed part of that most interesting assembly . Depend upon it, 
where there is a spirit of Christianity, there is a spirit which rises above forms, 
above ceremonies, independent of sect or creed , and the controversies of clash- 
ing doctrines. ' '.— [Webster. 



[7o] 

and of which system the State University is, or ought to 
be, not only apart but the central heart, should be not only 
friendly to, but foster what are esteemed among the most 
important elements of this treasure of civilization which we 
are handing over to the rising generation. When proper 
regard is had for this and due allowance is made for 
the diverse modes of accomplishing it, the reproach that 
the University has in it too little religion might with equal 
or greater plausibility be leveled against our age and civiliza- 
tion. 

That zeal for religious instruction may overshoot its 

mark, even in christian countries, has been abundantly 
demonstrated in Europe, but above all in Prussia, where, 
explain it as we may, the outcome has been formalism, in- 
fidelity, and all forms of negation from bottomless atheism 
to the vanities of nihilism, despite the heroic exhibition of 
creeds, scriptures and ceremonies in the state schools, — 
just what many church men among us insist is the only 
antidote. The virus itself appears to be in the supposed 
antidote, just as many officinal remedies when given in ex- 
cess, become the most deadly poison. Cases are on record 
where too much common salt has destroyed life ; and there 
is such a thing as being righteous overmuch. None of the 
schools of the European peoples are grounded like ours on 
the secular theory of the state. I conceive that the basis 
of our state system of schools is valid, and that the educa- 
tional function of the state, without pretending to exclu- 
siveness, admits of an irrefutable vindication. The work of 
education is one. The agencies for its accomplishment 
are numerous and clothed in diverse livery. 

For the sake of illustrating this matter let us note the 
situation of the body of students convened at this Univer- 
sity. Suppose that some one of the hundreds of thousands 
of the devotees of Confucius, now in our country, should 
come here with his son with the view of entering him as one 
of our students. Very naturally, he might feel some 
solicitude about the influences to which that son would 
here be subjected, and their tendency to estrange him from 



[70 

the religion of his fathers by making him a Christian 
instead of a follower of Confucius, in his religious convic- 
tions and sentiments. On the threshold of his inquiry, he 
might be told that the University is not a religious but a 
secular institution. But further information would satisfy 
him that that did not mean that it is either irreligious or 
anti-religious, — destitute of any religious influence or 
antagonistic to all religion. On the contrary, he would 
learn that eminent members and some ministers of the 
different Christian churches are in its Faculties of Instruc- 
tion ; that a considerable portion of the students are 
church members, and nearly all of them the children of 
Christian parents, so that from infancy they have been 
more or less directly under religious influence. More- 
over, he would find the Bible, or sacred book of the 
Christians, an open book inside of the walls of the in- 
stitution, just as he might also find all the other sa- 
cred books of the world, to the extent available and 
accessible, recommended to the attention of the students 
as worthy of an examination and comparison with the 
Christian Scriptures. He would not fail to notice that, in 
preference to the sacred books of the followers of Confu- 
cius, or of Budha, or of Zoroaster, or of Mahomet, the 
Bible of the Christians is singled out and placed in 
prominence. It would also attract his attention that the 
Corps of Instruction and their pupils assemble daily in a 
commodious hall of the University edifice to read a brief 
extract from the Christian's sacred book, to sing a song 
expressive of its sentiments, and to offer a brief prayer to 
the God it reveals. He might be told that when one of 
our most distinguished sages opened a school on Pennikese 
Island, lying off our eastern sea-coast, for the study of 
nature without the use of books of any kind whatever, 
his first act was to ask his pupils and colleagues to join 
with him in a silent prayer to the same Diety. Indeed, he 

would be assured on every hand by our people, in public 
and in private life, that in their esteem the God of the Bible 
and the God of nature is one and the same being, and that 



[72] 

these two volumes strikingly sustain each other's claims to 

an identity of authorship. This Chinese father, on making 

inquiry about the domestic accommodations of his son, 

would discover that, were these religious influences absent 

from the daily workings of the University, their presence 

in the surrounding community is so pronounced as to 

saturate the very air he would breathe. The family where 

he would probably board would likely be a Christian 

family, with its daily observance of religious devotion, In 

mid-week and on the Sabbath, he would observe them 

attend on public services, to say nothing of the interest 

which the young people, with whom he associated, would 

take in the Sunday School, and all the varied social and 

friendly influences of his private intercourse with Christian 

friends. So far as the vices and the irreligious influences of 

the community are concerned, they might appear to him 

less than those of the Celestial Empire; and if he had 

looked at other seats of learning in our country, in no way 

peculiar to this particular locality. Besides, he would 

observe that these agencies of vice hide their heads and 

deeds in darkness and shun the blazing light of the 

influences of Christianity which shines around like a sun in 

the heavens above. 

It is needless to say that this inquiring Chinese father, 

if he did not want his son to be under Christian influence, 

would, after this survey of the situation, retire and take 

his son with him. If assured that the University is not 

denominational — well, he might answer, I do not precisely 

understand that. In what you call the denominational 

colleges and schools, only one Christian denomination is 

seen in each of the faculties, and mainly among each body 

of students; but here, I find all the denominations, so 

that this seems to me to be the most denominational of all 

the schools. I am inclined to think that my son would 

be more liable to be captured here by the combined 

influences of all your denominations than though he were 

left to the influence of some one in particular. — To say the 

least there is some plausibilty in this view of matters. It 



[73] 

is notorious, however, that, with scarcely an exception, the 
church schools all disclaim proselyting influences and 
purposes. This is virtually a theoretic assumption of a 
non-denominational attitude towards all except the 
children of the church in whose interest the school is 
conducted ; and, except to that extent, this assump- 
tion neutralizes any superior advantages or attractions on 
the score of religion. But in every college community, as 
in this one, the families in which the students live belong 
to the various denominations, and are properly interested 
in patronizing their local institution, whether of the same 
phase of faith or not. The first graduate of Westminister 
College, the Presbyterian Synodical College of this State, 
was the son of Baptist parents resident near Fulton, and 
was himself a member of the Baptist church. After 
graduating, he was for a time a member of the Faculty of 
William Jewell College, the leading Baptist institution of 
this*5tate ; he became a minister of that church and died 
in its service. I recall with great pleasure and vividness, 
the working of his earnest and bright intellect in my 
class-room ; and I shall never forget the commencement 
occasion, 1855, when I placed the A, B. diploma in the 
hands of James G. Smith. This was my first official act, 
on a commencement occasion, as a worker in the field of 
education which spreads out so broadly before us in this 
great State. 

But to return to our Chinese father and friend, from whom 
we have for a time been separated : He might travel from 
one extremity of this land to another, and everywhere, in 
State Legislatures, in the halls of Congress, in the military 
and naval schools, and in both arms of the service, in na- 
tional proclamations of thanksgiving, in the date of every 
public document, in all these and in other ways, the evidence 
would look out and down upon him in attestation of Mr. 
Webster's utterance that Christianity is part of the life and 
common usage of the land. The general government, in 
the ordinance of 1787, initiated the policy of those princely 
grants for education, one of which laid the foundation of 



[74] 
this University on the admission of the State into the Union, 
55 years ago,*and another in 1862 established'its Agricul- 
tural and Mining Schools. That memorable^expression of 
the general government was couched in the following 
words : "Religion, morality, and knowledge, being neces- 
sary to good government and the happiness of mankind, (*) 
schools and the means of education shall forever be encour- 
aged." The patronage here pledged has been an established 
and active policy; and the practice of this policy was in- 
herited by the general government, as also by the individ- 
ual States, from the original colonies in which the religious' 
was the most dominant sentiment in initiating and fostering 
educational enterprises. Both my venerable predecessor 
and myself are graduates from State Universities which 
sprang into existence under the patronage of this educa- 
tional policy : it may be worth while to state that the oldest 
of these State Universities was that of Athens, Ohio, from 
which he graduated, and that the second in the order of 
time was Miami University, at Oxford, Ohio, from which I 
graduated, (f) Ohio took the initiative of the States in this 
line of action. 

What has now been said is not meant as an indication 
of a new departure, but only as an explanatory emphasis 
and defense of a state of fact, which I find in existence 
and which was explicitly set forth six years ago (1870) by 
the Board of Curators, in a document touching the organ- 
ization and purposes of this University. The following 
paragraph is found on page 1 1 of that document : 

"Then, again, it is to be understood that the State University is the 
University of a Christian people, with a Christian civilization and 
Christian ideas; and that while discarding sectarian teaching, the 
University can represent no other than a Christian community. 
Hence your committee will recommend, according to the practice of 
American colleges, the daily assembling of students and professors 
for worship, with the reading of the Bible, in the chapel of the 
University, not only on account of the religious and moral effect, but 



(*) Evidently referring - to the Declaration of Independence. 



(t) The present Covernor of Missouri, the 'Hon. Charles H. Hardin, is an 
Alumnus of Miami University . 



\7S] 

as tending to good order, regularity, and the social unity of the I'ni- 
versit\ T body." 

To single out this University, therefore, by open or 
covert representations — shall I not change the word and 
say, misrepresentations ? and brand it with odious imputa- 
tions calculated to injure it in the public esteem and 
confidence, can, in the light of what has been stated, be 
estimated at its true worth and credited to its proper 
motive. 

The religious attitude of this University has been 
presented as a state of fact, characterising its origin and 
qualifying in some measure its entire subsequent career 
and present structure, without any attempt at apologizing 
or discussing at large this condition of things as a general 
question. There is, it is conceived, no occasion for any 
such discussion. If there be any Chinese or other father, 
heathen or christian, who hesitates or declines to send his 
son here because there is too little or too much Christ- 
ianity in the institution, it is to be observed that the 
objective difficulty in such a case is not topical but consti- 
tutional. The animating Christian spirit of the University 
is the spirit of this commonwealth, and of this country 
and of its institutions. It created and was not created by 
this University. The real trouble, therefore, to this 
unchristian or anti-christian gentleman is in the tone and 
organization of our society to which it is necessary for 
him to conform or adapt himself, and thus to become 
Americanized; or else, as the condition of harmony, we 
should have to become unchristian or Chinese, An acute 
critic on our institutions has observed — ''There must be 
harmony between the political and religious schemes that 
are suited to a people." I would go one step further 
and say, that the educational scheme of every people must 
harmonise with doth its political and religious schemes. The 
century of our organic existence as a Republic, which has 
just closed, has disentangled the theories of church and 
state from some pernicious complications. But it is a 
singular and unfortunate circumstance that statesmen have 



[>6] 

more clearly and vigorously grasped the secular theory of 
government than ecclesiastes have the spiritual or strictly 
religious theory of the church ; so that, as political 
errorists in Europe run the church in subordination to 
state purposes ; so, in our midst, ecclesiastical errorists 
and fanatics are still guilty of the suicidal folly of attempt- 
ing conscientiously, of course, to control the secular power 
by ecclesiastical mandates. These two organizations are 
founded on different principles and exist for different 
purposes; neither is subject to the other, and each is, in 
its own sphere, sovereign and alone competent to its own 
peculiar work. Religion and eternity are the concerns of 
the church ; justice and good order in the vindication of 
the rights of persons and property, are the concerns of the 
State. The sole business concern that the State has with 
the church is to treat its members as citizens entitled to 
protection in their rights of person and property. The 
sole concern the church has with the State is simply to 
teach the citizens and leave them as individuals to act out 
their conscientious and Christian principles in all. the 
spheres of life's activities, subjected to no disability, and 
entitled to no favors nor immunities on the score of reli- 
gious profession or connection. In our State Universities, 
religion does its legitimate work, not by the mandates of 
ecclesiastical bodies, but by the influence of individual 
religious men, who possess the proper scientific and literary 
qualifications to entitle them, on that account, to University 
appointments. If there is an adverse discrimination to be 
made, then, assuredly ignorance and bigotry and incompe- 
tence are less tolerable under the garb of religion than 
under any other. Individual personal character, compe- 
tence, fidelity and success alone entitle to enduring confi- 
dence in this field of work. . 

It is needless to say that, if this University is to be 
anti-Christianized, heathenized or un-Christianized, it is no 
part of the duty of its Faculty or Curators to effect for it 
anv such transformation, unless such transformation be 
necessary in adapting it to its true end, as a University, in 



[771 

transmitting our existent and dominant civilization. Should 
the citizens of the State of Missouri, for whom this institu- 
tion exists and works, ever come to the recognition of 
Confucianism as now of Christianity, then the temple of 
its founder will doubtless be erected in Missouri as it is 
now in China in connection with all the colleges or exami- 
nation halls of the country. On the altars of these temples 
incense is ever kept burning. On the first day of 
every month, offerings of fruits and vegetables are rever- 
ently set forth, and on the 15th there is a solemn burning 
of incense. Twice in the year, on the first day of the mid- 
dle months of spring and autumn, the worship of Confucius 
is performed with peculiar solemnity. (*) At the Imperial 
College, Pekin, a membership in which is the highest at- 
tainment and distinction of Chinese genius and scholarship, 
the Emperor himself is required to attend in state and i s 
in fact the principal performer. After all the preliminary 
arrangements have been made and the Emperor has twice 
knelt and six times bowed his head to the earth, the pres- 
ence of Confucius' spirit is invoked in these words : "Great 
art thou, O, perfect sage! Thy virtue is full; thy doctrine 
is complete. Among mortal men there has not been thine 
equal. All kings honor thee, Thy statutes and laws have 
come gloriously down. Thou art the pattern in this Impe- 
rial school. Reverently have the sacrificial vessels been 
set out. Full of awe we sound our drums and bells." This 
is the Chinese home-model which we shall then copy ; and 
some successor of our worthy Governor, as the type of this 
altered civilization, will perform the genuflections, nuta- 
tions, invocations and reverent soundings of the drums and 
bells ! But until this change or some similar one transforms 
this commonwealth of Missouri, a greater than Confucius 
will probably continue to be worshipped at this chief seat 
of learning, quietly in spirit and in truth, Without the help 
and clatter of pagan "drums and bells." 

(*) Confucius was born 551 and died 47S, V,.C, aged 7;?, and nine years before 
Socrates was born. But it was not till (528, A. £>., over eleven hundred years 
after his death, that he attained the position of an independent object of worship. 
Previously, he had beejn associated with the Duke of Chow, to whom he often 
refers. "It is worship and not mere homage .' ' — Legge. 



[78] 

But there is a limit to human endurance, and as this 
audience has been attentive to different speakers now for 
about five hours, I will not presume further. Never did 
an age bristle with more themes of a broad and enduring 
interest, but the occasions for their discussion continually 
recur; whereas somethings of a practical import, however 
prosaic, had to be uttered here and now in the interests 
of a future good understanding, in preference to the 
entertaining luxuries of a literary or scientific discourse. 
Mr, President, Ladies and Gentlemen: I thank you 
i sincerely for your indulgent attention. 



CORRECTION. 

Page 58 in 12th line from top, transposition as follows : 
Instead of ''in this position forty nearly for years," read "in 
this position for nearly forty years," &e. 



APPENDIX. 



THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION.' 



State Teachers' Association, \ 
Jefferson City, Mo., Dec. 28, 1F76. j 

Under the head of "Discussion,'' with which the afternoon session 
opened, succeeding the essay of Prof. W. F. Bahlmann, of Warrens- 
burg, on the subject, "The Future of Education," Dr. S. S. Laws, 
President of the. University of the State of Missouri, having been called 
on for his views, rose and said: 

Mr. President: — I will respond with a few remarks on 
the topic before us. I did not hear the paper read which 
I believe is the foundation of this discussion. It is often a 
great inconvenience, that we cannot be in two places at the 
same time. The reason of not being here at the time of the 
reading of this paper was that I was in the room where the 
county commissioners were holding their meeting, as I felt 
an interest in learning as much as I could of all the busi- 
ness facts respecting our school system in Missouri. It is 
often quite difficult to get at the facts that underlie the 
system in a State like this. I have been absent from this 
state so long that I am in the attitude of a learner. 

I declined to serve on a committee this morning, as 



[8o] 

you will remember, Mr. President, on account of not taking 

in fully the precise condition in which we stand. I ought 

to say that although I did not hear Prof. Bahlmann's paper, 

he kindly handed me the manuscript, and I have looked 

it over. 

The University, as referred to by a number of speakers, 

and as is continually done in speaking of the whole system 
of educational work in this State, is not only placed at the 
top but its position seems to be remote and almost in- 
tangible. The impression left is one of isolation. I may be at 
fault, but I have a different impression. It seems to me that 
in this work of education, the ordinary principles of architec- 
ture are quite turned upside down, quite reversed, and instead 
of the University being at the top of this work it is at the 
bottom. It is the true foundation and fountain-head of our 
school work. If we properly interpret the studies taught 
in the public schools, even the most elementary work is 
done in the State University ; we will find, after all, that 
education is like the showers that distill from heaven, they 
first ascend and then come down and percolate the surface 
layers before reaching the lower strata. Educational influ- 
ences must first saturate the brains of the most cultivated 
and then come forth thence upon the masses who are built 
into the superstructure. Therefore, it appears to me that 
we have the most thoroughly elementary principles 
underlying this work wrought into the organization of the 
various State Universities, and that instead of being in the 
clouds we are at work at the very fountain and foundation. 
It is by the instrumentality of the very highest institutions, 
if you insist on so calling them,that intelligence will saturate 
the community and lead it to appreciate the work of the teach- 
er, and in every county will stimulate and sustain the opera- 
tions of the Supervisor or the Commissioner. It is by the 
public sentiment, thus created, that the people will carry on 
this work in its contest against darkness and ignorance, and 
also, that competent teachers will be sent out in this minis- 
try of life. We must have teachers, and have them quali- 
fied, in order that we may reach the youth. I was inter- 

" T. L 



[8i] 

ested in reading Horace Mann's report, in which he has 
detailed the operations of the schools in Prussia forty years 
ago, when he first made the trip of observation. His de- 
scriptions of the manner of handling classes by teachers, 
at that time, without books, is very graphic. They talked 
into the minds of the children what they knew, creating 
enthusiasm in the children. The teacher was all ablaze 
with his subject, and he came with living light shedding 
intelligence from his own illumined spirit upon and dissi- 
pating the darkness and ignorance of his classes. 

I need not amplify. Our State University is an institution 

where pupils should master the bottom principles of our 
whole school work. If we are to have the life's blood circu- 
late to the extremities it must be by the pulsations of a strong 
heart sending forth the life current on its mission to the 
most distal parts. When you weaken the pulsations of 
the heart the extremities suffer first and most. We must 
have this tremendous enginery at the centre, in good work- 
ing condition and in vigorous action, . As certain as the 
physical organism, which we are carrying about with us, is 
built by nature, dependent upon a central organ in healthy 
and vigorous action, so must our State University be recog- 
nized and counted upon as the heart of our school work in 

this State. 

There is one thought that seems to be the dominant one 

in this paper of Prof. Bahlmann and in the discussion upon 

it : What constitutes a symetrical education ? Are special 

courses and the useful studies compatible therewith ? Now, 

to compass that idea we must understand the mind to be 

educated, and then the means by which it is to be educated. 

I have no ideas on this topic, except such as cluster around 

a complete classification of the subjects of our present 

knowledge. 

I do not wish to be looked upon as pedantic or assum- 
ing to lecture in this matter, but I feel a sense of obligation 

to give utterance to what, at the moment, rises to thought 
and struggles for utterance. In my own mind, I have been 
accustomed to classify the whole domain of knowledge 
under three heads : 



[82] 

First — The Physiological Sciences. The Greek words phu- 
sis (nature), and logos (discourse) furnish the compound. Na- 
ture has several meanings, but it is as pointing to the do- 
main of matter that it is here to be understood. This sense I 
only refer to as the one governing this classification. 
Under this Physiological head we have, 1st, physics; 2d, 
chemistry ; 3d, natural history, which includes — a, miner- 
alogy ; b, botany : c, zoology ; d, geology, and in associa- 
tion with it, physical geography. That completes the round 
of the physical sciences ; those sciences commonly called 
natural sciences or simply the sciences. 

Second — Under the second head we have the Anthropo- 
logical Sciences — those having their seat in the mind as dis- 
tinct from matter. I may add, lest I should be misunder- 
stood, that in my interpretation of nature, I hold that the evi- 
dence is as strong for the reality of mind as for that of mat- 
ter ; and that if we discriminate, we have stronger evidence 
for mind than for matter, as it is only through mind that we 
know matter. The sciences are a creation of the intellect 
and not a biological evolution. — Under the Anthropological 
Sciences we have those strictly psychological, as 1st 
mathematics; 2d, logic; 3d, aesthetics; 4th, ethics; 5th, poli- 
tics, or the political sciences of economics, government and 
law ; and 6th, psychology proper, as pre-supposing the 
revelations of mind in the several preceding special phases. 

Third — In a line beyond all these comes Metaphysical 
Science, properly so-called, which goes back of all these 
phenomenal phases and correlations of nature, to examine 
into the evidence of the reality and substantial entity of — 
first, mind; second, matter; and third, Deity, or the 
theistic theory of the Universe. 

There is my grouping of the whole range of human 
knowledge as it stands before the present intelligence of 
our age. These are our trivium and quadrivium which 
embraced the whole of human knowledge when University 
work began in the middle ages. 

1. Now, if these be the groups of subjects which 



[83] 
broadly lie within the grasp of the human intellect, then 
we see whence we are to procure our weapons of warfare 
against ignorance, and of what we must take account in 
estimating a complete or symmetrical education. 

2. Another remark which may be made in refer- 
ence to the whole compass of knowledge is that, through- 
out it v/e proceed in our mental working primarily through 
the phenomena of the senses, The original and constitu- 
tutional endowments of the mind which precede all cogni- 
tion, are awaked into activity through the senses. It would 
seem natural, therefore, that those phenomena coming 
through the senses should first receive our attention in the 
work of education. I am satisfied that in the ordinary 
arrangement of study, books are put too prominently in 
the foreground. I think the subjects which address the 
senses should be brought to the foreground : so to speak 
the natural sciences should be trotted to the front, and we 
should reach books through nature rather than nature 
through books. I am working, with my colleagues in the 
University, on a programme which I found in existence, 
but which I do not approve. It is too bookish. Books 
should be made more conspicuous by their absence. 

I hope to see the day when we will be able to modify 
our work so as to get nearer t© the works of nature than 
we are now, for at present the works of men crowd nature 
into the background. 

3. But the third observation is this : That where we aim 
to give a complete course of education, as this range of 
subjects indicated touches alFsides of the mind, this whole 
group of knowledge should be properly adjusted and 
compassed. A mastery of it is not practicable for the 
ordinary student; the best that we can do is to act the 
part of gleaners. 

What is the young man when he has taken the degree 
from our institutions? He is a mere beginner. To the 
question, "what is the use of going through college ?" it 
has been answered — "to find out how little there is in it." 



[84] 

Who is there here who took his first degree ten, fifteen or 
twenty years ago, I care not how proud he may be of the 
names on his diploma, who does not appreciate the full 
force of the remark ? 

The educational facilities of the day serve to abbreviate 
the work of gleaning the field and of selecting a specialty. 
Our schools are a certain phonographic or short-hand 
process to help the student in the race, though all must 
run for themselves. 

I confess myself to be somewhat of a utilitarian in the 
work of education, and I think the whole subject has been 
somewhat misconceived. Consequences do not constitute 
but they do reveal principles; and if we will only carry 
with us that distinction, we need not be afraid of utilitari- 
anism, either in the subtle dialogues of Socrates or in the 
ingenious pages of Paley. It is the fruit of the tree that 
reveals but it does not constitute the qualities of the sap ; 
that has been elaborated by the leaf. So, therefore, it is 
perfectly logical, within the sphere of ethics, to take 
widely into consideration the consequences as revealing 
the controlling principles of action and disclosing whether 
these principles are right or wrong. You cannot get good 
fruit from a bad tree. 

Now, under this general propositon, it seems to me that 
it is exceedingly interesting to observe that at one point 
it assists us as to the attention to be given to special 
courses of instruction and study. 

I favor, properly understand, special courses, and there 
is a great reason for it ; it is this, that all truth is one and 
harmonious, accordant with nature at whatever point you 
take hold of it with a firm grasp. 

As a friend once said to me, when I called on him 'and 
found a manuscript, on which he was working as a pro- 
fessional matter, pushed aside, and some loose papers 
lying before him covered with figures — "Laws, look here. 
Did you ever see anything like it?" Then he went on to 
show me with enthusiasm how one mathematical propo- 
sition leads to another in endless series. Said he — "It is 



[85] 

like the links of a chain, get hold of one and it pulls all 
after it." There he was, enthusiastically pulling out the 
links as an intellectual gymnastic. 

And so it is, take hold of any truth and, if we properly 
work, we will, within our sphere of action, bring the whole 
body of truth into revelation. 

I am confident that the whole matter of special work in 
our institutions will be found harmonious with our general 
work, and that by it we will build stronger and better than 
without it. If we misunderstand our work, then the dam- 
age and confusion consequent upon our ignorant smug- 
glings will be proportioned to the very fineness of the 
steel and the keenness of the edge of the instrument 
which in our blindness we may be handling. 

Let us, as teachers, then, aim to understand our work 
in its true aims and in the means best suited to attain the 
same, and then will "wisdom be justified of her children" 
in the school room. 



THE RELATION OF THE INDEPENDENT 

COLLEGES TO THE SYSTEM OF 

STATE SCHOOLS. 



In a discussion of a paper by President Morrison on "The relation 
of the independent college to the system of state schools," Dr. S. S. 
Laws, President of the University of the State of Missouri, said: 

Mr, President : — I wish to make two remarks, and the 
first one has reference to the frequent allusions to the Ger- 
man University, I could name books that have been 
written by gentlemen from the German Universities, 
which contain strictures and suggestions calculated to 
mislead the public mind and which have misled it. I have 
myself been seriously misled upon a particular point, as 
to the relation of the German to the American University. 

The American University is not like the German Univer- 
sity, and the exact point of difference is this : That in our 
American University the academic course is the nucleus 
around which all else clusters. It is the central point of 
development and of organization. But the German Uni- 
versity has no undergraduate course. This course is 
taught in the gymnasium, and it would be necessary to 
take up the German gymnasium bodily and plant it down 
in the midst of a German University, to establish this vital 
point of the analogy. 

But this would explode the German system, as it now 
stands. 

Bating some irregularities and exceptions, the German 
University matriculates only college graduates. Hence, 



[87] 
the discipline of the members of the University commu- 
nity is that of professional schools with us. The gymna- 
sia, which correspond to our colleges and to the academic 
departments of our Universities, have a discipline quite as 
rigid as the strictest of our undergraduate courses. The 
lectures so often given us respecting our University discip- 
line are utterly impertinent, for a young man has to grad- 
uate at the gymnasium before he is regularly admitted to 
the University in Germany. The Faculty in Philosophy 
in the German University does not do undergraduate but 
post-graduate work, in the line of various specialties. 

Moreover, American boys, or men, carry away the 
degrees of German Universities upon other conditions 
than the native youth. The reason is that the German 
Universities are in the line of the civil service. For a 
native German to gain a position at the law, or in medi- 
cine, or as an ecclesiastic, his University degree is indis- 
pensable. But to our American youth the degree may 
mean almost nothing at all in Germany. 

-The gymnasium corresponds to our college or academic 
department, being perhaps' more thorough in the classics 
but less complete than our best colleges in the sciences. 

The American University came originally from England. 
It is still trammelled by some miserable monastic features of 
the middle ages, among which may be instanced the dor- 
mitory system. It is an unmitigated evil for youth to be 
isolated from the domestic influences of the family circle 
during the formative period of college life. This antique 
patch upon our garments at the University of Missouri, I 
hope to see fall not only into discredit but into entire dis- 
suetude. Ours is a ham-drum American University of 
which the academic department is crowned by the degree 
of Batchelor of Arts. There are other equivalent courses. 
And then we have the professional schools of Normal In- 
struction, Agriculture, Law and Medicine, in fact, at 
present, the institution consists of a group of associated 

and co-operative schools, each having its head-centre. The 
classical curriculum has received various modifications in 



[88] 

our American institutions, but nevertheless it runs through 
our educational system throughout the land, like a golden 
thread. Our unique American University is, in my 
opinion, better for us than the German article. 

There is not now in the Missouri University any prepar- 
atory department. The rabble that bore that name has 
been dispersed, and the work of the English and Normal 
schools has been thereby relieved from incongruities. 
Preparatory work is done by each school for itself and in 
its own classes. 

2. The second thing on my mind, when I arose to 
speak, Mr. President, was the relation of the University to 
the various denominational or independent colleges of 
this State. There are only about eight or ten of them, 
and, without exception, all are feeble and struggling for 
continued existence, 

About the time of returning to this State, I met with one 
of the most distinguished gentleman of the east. In a 
conversation he said to me — " Laws, one thing you have 
to do is to kill off those little colleges and have one great 
institution." I said. President, there are two very strong 
reasons in my mind why I should not commit myself to 
such a course of action. The first is that these denomina- 
tional colleges won't be killed off, and a man undertaking 
to engage in practical work must not disregard what is 
practicable. They have a tenacity of life which a man 
who attempts to overthrow them will find, perhaps, is equal 
if not superior to his own. 

The second reason that I gave him was, that they not 
only insist on living, but that they have a title to life which 
goes back to the very foundations of our American civil- 
ization ; from that time until now, religious bodies have 
acted a leading part in our work of education. 

It is also true that these private schools are doing a 
good work, entitled to be recognized, and which, without 
their action, would be left undone. 

With reference to our present posture at the University, 
I happen to know some things of value by an experience 



[89] 

in this State in former years. I once felt the stinging of a 
lash wielded by a vigorous hand in the position in which I 
now happen to be. I was sensitive, being connected with 
an independent college, of anything that seemed to dispar- 
age the independent schools and to claim for the Universi- 
ty what I did not feel called on to accord to it on the score 
of merit or of pretention. The idea has been more or less 
current hitherto, that the private colleges are to be treated 
as inferior and tributary to the University. There is a 
serious error committed at that point, which has ministered 
to ill feeling and confusion in the State of Missouri. 

As I have just explained that, in the Missouri Univer- 
sity, as in most of our American Universities, the academic 
department is the nucleus, the fundamental part of the 
University. 

Now, take the academic part of the University and 
bring it into comparison with these private colleges and it 
is on a dead level with them. This assertion of superior 
claims over them in the work of teaching the academic 
curriculum, is not well founded, and is consequently offen- 
sive because unjust. The academic department of the 
University is simply a college, and it has identically the 
same general course of study that is pursued. in these pri- 
vate colleges. Where is the superiority? It may be in 
pretention but not in fact, for the actual work done in cer- 
tain lines is done by some of them a*> well as it is done in 
the University colleges, and in some things perhaps better. 
The University and the colleges should occupy the posi- 
tion of equality as co-workers in the same field, and 
engaged in the same general work, so that the academical 
department of the University should not pretend to supe- 
riority. 

What I have in mind, and will now express, is something 
to which I ask the attention of all co-workers in this State. 

Why should not our academic faculty of the University 
and the academic faculty of eachof the denominational col- 
leges throughout the State meet together on equal footing 
and effect a literary confederation ? To take a single depart- 



[90] 

ment as a means of illustration : Let alt the professors of 
mathematics constitute a board on the mathematical stud- 
ies; let them determine upon their curriculum, having a 
margin of equivalence, so that a certain flexibility of co- 
operation would be practicable. There would then be a 
certain freedom exercised, on the part of each professor, in 
leading classes over the work agreed upon in the mathe- 
matical course to be pursued in all our colleges. The oth- 
er departments could be arranged in exactly the same way. 
There is no need of repetition. One department serves as 
an example for all. 

When the candidates for graduation of the several col- 
leges are to pass their examination, let them go before a 
committee of examiners, to be appointed by these boards, 
made up of the professors of the several departments. Let 
all the candidates pass through the same examination pa- 
pers, so that their examination will be exactly the same ; 
and then all the students from these institutions united in 
this literary confederation, who pass the prescribed exam- 
inations, will be graduated; and let this be the form, for ex- 
ample : A William Jewell College graduate of the Univer- 
sity of the State of Missouri ; or a Westminster College 
graduate of the University of the State of Missouri. And 
so of the others. There is nothing empirical in this. This 
is precisely what has been done in the Universities of Eng- 
land for ages. Take Oxford, for example. There are as- 
sociated there over twenty different institutions, each having 
its separate organization, its own faculty, government and 
tutorial arrangements. (*) If a student has passed, and is 
successful in his examination, if from Balliol college, he 
becomes a Balliol College graduate of the University of 
Oxford. The graduate of the individual College thus be- 
comes the graduate of the University. 

It seems to me, therefore, that the academic or collegiate 



(*) Each year the candidates of these several schools come hefore a common 
board of examiners and pass the same examination, and those passing become 
graduates of the University of Oxford.— It is the same at Cambridge and at the 
Queen's University, Ireland, the several colleges of which are located in differ- 
ent towns. 



[90 

department of the State University might thus be brought 
into co-operation with the private institutions, and these 
several institutions share the honors of the central State 
University ; and then we would have what I would term the 
Missouri system. It would not be empirical, but in its 
principle rest upon the experience of ages. 

We do not need, nor desire, any legislation about it. It is 
a literary confederation that is alone competent to meet the 
exigencies of the case. 

In proposing and urging this scheme, we stand upon the 
just and proper ground that the commonwealth of Missouri 
is utterly indifferent where the individual is educated within 
the State, provided the education received is a good one, 
qualifying properly for the duties of citizenship. It is the 
province of the State, to provide the sort of education 
which her youth should have in the present age, as fairly 
judged by the opportunities and responsibilities of the pres- 
ent and the future. And, then, if the private colleges do 
not come up to this standard, the University is open and 
ready to receive them. It seems to me that we have here 
the true principles upon which our whole educational work 
should be conducted. 

There are several advantages which this literary confed- 
eration and co-operation, as explained, would bring to us. 

First — it would establish a standard of education so that 
those institutions that pretend to be colleges, and do not 
do college work, would at once lose cast and drop out of 
the misplaced confidence of the public. Let them pass our 
examinations, or they will reveal their true character by 
their fruits, It will give a distinct plan to those institu- 
tions as doing secondary work, and it will stimulate the 
real colleges to higher efforts. We have, then, an or- 
ganizing and systematizing influence at once flowing from 
such an arrangement. 

Second — this literary federation and co-operation will 
tend largely to increase the spirit of education in the 
State. This is of primary importance ; for if we can 



[92] 

arouse the spirit of education, all will share in the 
shower. 

It seems to me, therefore, that by breaking down this 
indifference to the work of education, it will be strength- 
ened in all its departments. 

I feel an interest in this as a member of the State 
Teachers' Association, and it seems to be something Avhich 
we ought to attain. 

I expect to take active steps to secure a convention of 
those connected with private colleges, that we may have a 
fair and full consultation over the general scheme now 
indicated. I now bespeak your favorable attention to it. 

It is believed that co-operation and confederation can be 
attained ; and if we can attain it, we hive laid the founda- 
tion for a good work. 

Third — It will not in the slightest unfavorably affect the 
patronage that these institutions enjoy ; but it will the 
more firmly fix them in the public confidence and improve 
their literary features. They will still haye the distinctive 
features belonging to them, as the private colleges of dif- 
ferent bodies. We weaken nothing ; we strengthen every- 
thing. Hence there is no good reason for isolation or 
opposition. 

If any one does not wish to join with us there is no 
quarrel. Less than the whole may enter into this confed- 
eration to make trial of its virtues. 

Fourth — It is another point of advantage that this 
arrangement seems to offer the encouragement and hope 
of a complete organization of our educational work in the 
State, for that organization will not be complete till the 
private and the public schools are all made interdependent 
and co-operative in some such way as that now indicated. 



"THE TRUTH IN ITS RELATIONS TO 
THE EDUCATOR'S WORK." 



An address, by Dr. S. S. Laws, President of the University of the 
State of Missouri, before the Missouri State Tea.chers' Association, in 
Jefferson City, December 28th, 1876. 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — The name 
of this Association, — The Missouri State Teachers' Asso- 
ciation, — designates the class of persons who compose it. 
Teaching has asserted and successfully vindicated its claims 
as one of the learned professions. In all civilized countries, 
those who devote themselves to this vocation occupy a 
respectable social position and are esteemed useful citizens. 
If there be any inferiority in a given case, it is due not to 
the profession or occupation, but to personal defects. 

In our country, also may I not say even in Missouri, it 
is worth that makes the man or woman in this calling, and 
that the rank is but the guinea's stamp. 

My theme is — "The Relation of Truth to the Educator's 
Work." What is that work ? What is the truth ? and 
what the relations subsisting between these things ? 

I confess to an inability to appreciate the refined distinc- 
tions which are frequently urged between the work of the 
teacher and of the educator, as though the teacher merely 
imparted knowledge, whereas the educator as distinguished 
from the mere teacher, is more particularly occupied in 
unfolding or educing and drawing forth the powers of the 
mind with which he is occupied. I take it that the true 
teacher is a true educator. 

This work of education has two very distinct phases, and 



[94] 

for lack of better terms, I have been accustomed to distin- 
guish the one as plastic education and the other as scholastic 
education. With the view of briefly explaining the differ- 
ence of the import of these expressions, an illustration 
may be given of what is meant by plastic education. Only 
a few days since, a man of high social position, who was a 
member of a body convened in one of the cities of this 
state, and who took an active part in the deliberations, 
handed me some resolutions which he had prepared, and 
in so doing he apologized for them because he had not had 
the advantages of early education, and hence felt sure that 
defects would appear in the resolutions, from which he was 
apprehensive that unfavorable impressions might be received. 
His sensitive, self-distrust in so simple a literary performance 
was painful and embarrassing. I could not, at the time, 
feel otherwise than deeply impressed with the grievous 
disadvantges under which those labor whose education has 
been only of this plastic kind. Every grown man and 
woman is, in this plastic sense, an educated person. The 
surrounding influences, in the midst of which we grow up, 
continually mould us as the clay is moulded upon the 
potter's wheel, so that we attain an education of this plastic 
kind, whether any careful hand has intelligently guided us 
or not into the varied walks of life. But many who have 
been thus shaped for life fortuitously, exaggerate their 
disadvantages; whereas, the less meritorious are only too 
apt to rush to the opposite extreme of the arrogance of 
ignorance. 

As distinguished from this spontaneous and fortuitous 
unfolding of the life, scholastic education proposes to 
organize this work, first by an intelligent selection of an 
end, and then, by the exercise of wisdom in the choice of 
the very best means for the attainment of the contemplated 
result. 

It is in this work of scholastic education, as I understand 
it, sir, that we, as teachers, are engaged in the measure of 
our united capacities and efforts. It is as scholastic 
educators — as workers in the schoolroom, that we are 



[95] 

organized into this Association. I rejoice in the opportunity 
offered me, on this occasion, of mingling with you, and o* 
sharing in these deliberations and discussions for our 
mutual improvement, not the least important feature of which 
may be the acquaintance formed here with fellow-workers, 
whose genial influences may go with us as a source of 
strength and joy in our fields of work. 

In the performance of this work of scholastic education, 
what is it that is really attempted or done by us? Our 
work of educating the rising generation, we often seek to 
define. At this point, the inquiry again forces itself upon 
us: What,then,is the simplest and most elementary concep- 
tion that we can form of it ? It seems to me to be this : 
The aim of our work of scholastic education is the 
conservation and transmission of our civilization. We 

i 

gather up the sound principles of life's activities, which we 
haye inherited and tested. We impress these upon the 
minds of our pupils, of our children and youth, trusting 
that they, in their turn, will, in like manner, inculcate the 
same, in an improved form, upon those who shall follow 
after them. From the public school, where there is given 
the most elementary instruction — from the Kindergarden 
play ground and Paradise to within the walls of the most 
cultured institution, but one thought permeates the edu- 
cator's work and that is the transmission of our civiliza- 
tion, in all its best elements, to future generations. 

Now, Mr. President, it is my belief that the one great 
instrumentality which is alone effective in the accomplish- 
ment of this work and the achievement of this result is 
the truth. That is the conviction under whose inspiration 
I have been emboldened to announce my topic as worthy 
of the few minutes reflection allotted to this duty. 

What is the truth ? and what use shall we make of it? 

These are the two questions which now claim our 
attention. Is it venturesome to undertake a definition of 
truth ? Yet we must know what it is before we can intel- 
ligently acquire and use it. It is worthy of the effort, and 



[96] 

in aid thereof let it be observed that it presents two very 
distinct phases, each of which must be contemplated in 
order to appreciate either. Its speculative phase and its 
practical phase must be viewed in correlation. The spec- 
ulative phase of truth may be thus viewed and defined, 
viz : Speculative truth consists in the conformity of our . 
convictions to the reality of things. The standard or cri- 
terion by which the truthfulness of our convictions is to 
be tested, then, is the entire system of the universe of 
which we ourselves form but a constituent part. When 
the best thinkers of our race, who turned their thoughts 
to the phenomena of the planetary system, concluded that 
the geocentric theory accorded with facts, they seemed to 
have really attained the truth ; but we now know that it is 
the heliocentric theory that accords with the actual phe- 
nomena of nature. The one according to our present 
knowledge, is a delusion, the other is the truth* Why? 
Because the view that the earth is our planetary center 
was not accordant with the reality of things and had to 
give way to the demonstrated iact that the sun is the focal 
center of our system. There is in this heliocentric theory 
a conformity of the conviction of the mind with the actual 
state of things in the universe surrounding us. Look at 
the same thought in the sphere of the affections. There 
is a very ancient story of Cupid and Psyche which illus- 
trates it very simply and beautifully, and which enters 
intimately within the charmed circle of life's experiences. 
What is the difference between spontaneous and reflective 
love ? Spontaneous love arises on certain conditions, such 
as the knowledge of its object, the perception of certain 
supposed excellencies therein, a feeling of congeniality 
therewith based upon those attributes with which our spirits 
feel sympathy and, as the culmination of all this, the 
desire of possession becomes pre-dominant. If the loved 
object be actually attained, then the question arises as to 
whether there has been a mistake — whether the ideal has 
a corresponding reality ? And if it occnrs, nay, how often 
has it occurred, that the sincerest love has been curdled 



T97] 

into hatred most intense ? The reason is that the object 
loved proves to be quite other than the supposed object 
won. The truth of the case is absent ; the convictions of 
the mind do not conform to the reality in question. The 
image of truth was on the drop curtain, but when actual 
experience and reflection lifted the veil, the reality disclosed 
was only the sham and tinsel of the stage. The story says 
that Cupid wedded Psyche, unseen by his bride. Psyche, 
with the characteristic curiosity of her gender, determined 
that she must see the supposed beautiful form of Cupid, 
which he had kept so studiously concealed from her view. 
She knew he was as beautiful as her very ideal, and wished 
only to feast her hungering vision. She sought opportunities, 
and at length succeeded. Approaching the couch where 
Cupid lay asleep, with one hand she carefully removed the 
surrounding curtains, and then with the other hand holding 
the light over the object of her devotions. Lo ! a drop of 
burning oil from her lamp fell upon his revealed but 
ill-shaped and disgusting form. He awoke and fled indig- 
nant; and she, disgusted, mourned the sad loss. The illusion 
was dispelled, the charm was broken. The revulsion was 
inevitable. The false can not bear the light. The truth 
alone endures the test of reflection and experience. Happy is 
he or she whose spontaneous and reflective loves are 
coincident in the truth. The reality did not accord with 
the ideal. True affection, therefore, is that which loves and 
endures because the reality answers and accords with the 
expectations of the heart. And in like manner, the 
distinction holds when we look upon the department of 
the will. I have sometimes 'thought that the expression, 
"Not my will, but Thine be done," is one of the sublimest 
utterances in human language. The perfect accordance of 
a human will with the will of the Governor of the Universe 
is a sublime spectacle of true manhood unsurpassed. Of 
course this utterance assumes the theistic theory of the 
universe. From whatever point the record itself may be 
viewed, that theory was manifestly the one with which the 
actor in question was imbued, and in the light of which his 



[98] 

life must be interpreted. Whether the theistic theory of 
the universe is true is an open question into which we are 
not now called upon to enter. This may be observed, 
however, that man's moral nature remains as it is, whether 
the theistic view is true or not. It is true that, on the 
non-theistic view, our systems of ethics, as constructed, 
would necessarily undergo transformation; and the question 
might then well be considered, Whether public and private 
morals would survive the change. Still, it must be borne 
in mind that the foundation of man's obligations is in his 
relations and proximately and primarily in man's relations 
to man. Were there no being higher than himself, these 
relations would still exist; and man could never ask relief 
from those binding obligations of nature that have their 
foundation in his original constitution, which comes to each 
individual in common with his race from nature, let nature 
come whence it may. 

Bearing in mind these diverse applications of the crite- 
rion of speculative truth, in the correlation of subjective 
with objective nature — the inward with the outward — -the 
individual with the general — then we must note that there 
are three radically distinct views as to the reality of the 
universe, which, according to our definition of speculative 
truth, as consisting in man's convictions conforming to 
the reality of things, must be brought under review. 

The one theory is that of such as Fichte who holds all 
is a delusion. Scientific scepticism, in our modern days, is 
represented by Fichte, and by Hume who is the prince of 
sceptical critics. According to this eminent German 
dreamer, it is insisted that all this system of things has 
no reality — not even the reality of a dream ; nay, nor even 
so much as the reality of a dream of a dream — all is delu- 
sion. Nihilism reigns supreme; zero is absolute. 

Then there is a second view which I have been accus- 
tomed to designate, becuuse of knowing of no better form 
of expression, scientific unitarianism. According to this 
second view, there is but one reality in the universe and 
that reality exists, it may be, in matter or it may be in 



[99] 
mind. The scientific consequences are in either, case the 
same ; it matters not which is accepted to the exclusion or 
disparagement of the other. The materialist explains 
away all that evidences mind, and the spiritualist explains 
away all that evidences matter; and each alike, by refusing 
to recognize all the facts as facts, and insisting on the 
reception of only a part mutilates the body of truth. 

The third theory may be termed, and very properly, 
scientific dualism. According to this third view, all the 
facts that present themselves to us in nature are looked 
upon as having reality, so that upon the same principle of 
judgment, we recognize the teaching that matter exists and 
that mind also exists. By parity of inference we con- 
clude that a similar reality attaches both to mind and to 
matter. But, recognizing mind and matter as alike real, 
the question comes back upon us in its full force — with 
which of these theories is it that our convictions must 
stand in conformity in order to bear the test of truthful- 
ness ? I need not say that it is the conviction of the 
speaker, that scientific dualism alone gives the complete 
answer. This view alone, it is conceived, accords with the 
actual state of facts. Hence, it is only the mind that has 
come into acquiescence with this third theory of the reality 
of things whose convictions are speculatively truthful. 
Still, it is a disputed question, which of these views is 
true ; and hence, also, what is the precise criterion that 
each is to apply. This is not the sphere of dogmatism. 

Then, beyond these three alternatives, the further ques- 
tion presents itself — whether the theistic theory of the 
universe is the ultima thult of the domain of fact? Upon 
this, as already intimated, there is not the slightest occa- 
sion to enter further at present, 

Now, in the prosecution of our investigations, there are 
certain sources of evidence and certain canons of evidence, 
which I will very briefly indicate, as facilitating the success- 
ful investigation in search of truth. Our sources of evi- 
dence are chiefly — -first, consciousness ; second, the logical 



[ioo] 

understanding or discursive reason; third, faith; and 
fourth, testimony. 

Consciousness is primary, and we cannot go back of its 
evidence for phenomenal facts ; and on the dual theory of 
nature, according to which matter and mind both exist and 
are face to face in our own constitution, consciousness 
recognizes, not only the facts of mind, but also the primary 
facts of matter itself. 

The discursive reason also brings to light evidence not 
otherwise apparent. This is made evident by a simple 
proposition of geometry. The triangle may be evident to 
any sane person on first sight, without his dreaming that 
its three angles are equal to two right angles. 

As to faith, we must have and do have faith in the exer- 
cise of every power of our own minds, else we would not 
rely thereon, and all our experiences would become illu- 
sory. This fiducial function of the mind is not adven- 
titious but a primary element of our mental furniture, and 
gives fixedness to our intelligent activities ; it also reaches 
forth as the tendrils of the climbing vine to grasp the 
world beyond one's self as presented by testimony. 

Testimony comes to us from living witnesses, from docu- 
ments, from institutions and from monuments. Those 
who visited the old State House in Philadelphia during 
the Centennial Exposition cannot have forgotten that safe 
with doors standing wide open, and a policeman by its 
side, watchfully guarding a document which was spread 
out in full and occupied its whole interior. That docu- 
ment is the original Declaration of American Independ- 
ence of the British Crown. There are the names as origi- 
nally written by the renowned signers. The living actors 
in that great political event are all dead, but who that has 
seen this instrument can doubt its reality? Then the 
institution of our Fourth of July tells when the old cracked 
monumental bell rang forth the signal that the three 
millions were free whom Henry pronounced invincible. 

When we gather information from various sources, there 



[10!] 

are certain canons or principles of evidence which control 
the mind's operation in its search for truth, as — 

First. The human mind is so constituted as to be capa- 
ble of apprehending truth. Were this not so, we would 
be reduced to a condition of imbecility ; and truth and 
falsehood would be alike to us. 

Second. All truth must be received upon evidence. No 
truth can be apprehended except in the light of evidence. 
When we come to contemplate the evidence which we 
have accumulated in order to the recognition of truth, we 
find that some of it is obvious, as in the mathematics; but 
the most of it is contingent and admits of various degrees, 
from a bare presumption up to moral certainty. 

What is our logic ? Can we teach our classes any sim- 
pler view of it than that it consists in the marshalling of 
evidence in support of truth, derived from one or more of 
the sources laid down already ? 

Third. The third canon or principle which controls us 
in the investigation of truth is this : That adequate and 
pertinent evidence apprehended and appreciated necessi- 
tates belief. Hence, it is with perfect propriety that we 
affirm that belief is not voluntary but necessary. No man 
can believe or disbelieve just as he wills. Adequate evi- 
dence, or what is supposed to be adequate evidence, when 
apprehended and properly appreciated by the mind, it is 
not our option whether we will or will not acquiesce in 
the truth of that which is thus in evidence. We are not 
so free as we often conceive ourselves to be. Our freedom 
is held in the firm grasp of the laws of our being. 

Fourth. A fourth canon or ultimate principle in the in- 
vestigation of truth is that every truth must rest upon its 
own evidence. 

My personal existence ; that I am a moral agent ; that 
I am free, all rest on consciousness. That there is a sun 
in yonder heavens is a very different proposition, and rests 
on a different line of evidence. We are not conscious of 
that. The senses alone are not adequate ; reason is 
brought into play, and the cumulative proof is the same in 



[102] 

principle as that which supports the laws of nature which 
lie outside of the domain of consciousness. 

There are four pending issues, which occupy the minds 
of leading thinkers, whose determination must fall under 
this special canon, viz: I, The conservation of energy ; 
2, evolution; 3, the reality of the vital force; 4, the dual 
constitution of man, which involves the unitarian or dual 
theory of the universe. 

Each of these questions depends for its issuance on evi- 
dence, and yet the evidence must be peculiar to each. 
What would prove or disprove one might have no conclu- 
sive force in the determination of another. In each case, 
the real point of interest is simply this : What is the 
truth? and the mind's conclusion must depend on the 
evidence. * 

Fifth. There is a fifth canon: That all truth is harmo- 
nious. 

The Egyptians had a story of Python who, with his 
conspirators, assailed the good Osiris, hewed to pieces his 
body and scattered over the earth the bleeding and qujver- 
ing fragments. Then the devoted Isis, that she might 
restore the loved form in hope of its being revived anew 
with life, sallied forth in her devoted and untiring search 
for each of its parts. 

Truth is one, though dismembered and scattered ; and, 
like Isis, those who venture to be her devotees are search- 
ing for and bringing into organic union limb after limb 
and the restoration goes bravely on. 

Hopeful are the students of nature that we will yet see 
this divine form reanimated. 

Pythagoras was certainly one of the most remarkable 
of the ancient philosophers. He dominated over his pupils 
with such authority that his word superceded all inquiry. 
His followers and admirers exagerated his powers and 
attributed to hirn supernatural faculties. They supposed 
that his vision beheld what none else could see, and that 
his ears heard voices inaudible to other mortals. Hence 
it was he, who in their imaginings, heard the music of the 



[103] 
spheres. Since we have learned more than he knew, yet 
enough to be surprised at what he knew and to find the 
harmony that exists in nature's workings, and the har- 
mony of numbers in planetary motions and in the sweet 
concord of sounds, we are prepared to sympathise with 
the dream that there was music in the spheres. For truth, 
in its very essence, seems to be the harmony of the uni- 
verse, and those from whose ears the deadening influences 
of superstition and error fall away, seem to catch these 
sweet voices as they come to us from all parts of the uni- 
verse, to which every intelligent cultured power of the 
soul will respond as never before in the history of our 
race. Often we fall back on this canon with great satis- 
faction, when we find evidence sustaining different truths 
whose reconciliation we cannot compass, as freedom and 
moral certainty, the reality of mind and the reality of 
matter. 

Now, with reference to these canons, I will simply say 
that they are laws of the human intellect, and that by 
obeying them it is made conformable to nature in her 
workings and in her principles; and this conformity is the 
essential constituent of speculative truthfulness. 

There is another phase of truth than that hitherto con- 
sidered, and the same definition, with but little alteration, 
answers our purposes. Practical ttuth consists in the con- 
formity of our expressions with our convictions. The 
truthfulness of our practical life consists in the conformity 
of our expressions with our speculative convictions. Our 
convictions are the standard of practical truth ; so that the 
standard of practical truth is within ourselyes; but the 
standard of speculative truth is without ourselves. Our 
expressions mainly exist under the forms of language and 
of acts. 

I must be brief here, and hence, allow me to sum it all 
up by saying that if our lives be truthful as measured by 
our convictions, and our convictions truthful as measured | 
by the standard of nature, then we will necessarily be the I 



2d 



[104] 

enemies of all shams, whether these shams come within 
the sphere of our life's work as teachers, in the social or 
political or religious sphere. 

Why should not the educators of the day be haters of 
shams? How can those who are the students of truth 
hold any other than the attitude of hostility to all shams, 
to all hypocricy, to all deceits, to all attempts at making 
false impressions upon the public respecting our institu- 
tions, whether public or private ? Why should we repre- 
sent that we have advantages equal it may be to the best 
institutions in the land, when, if sufficiently intelligent to 
be entitled to the expression of an opinion, we know in 
our hearts that, with a few exceptions, it is not so? 

The spirit, then, in which this whole subject may be 
pursued is of incalculable import. A single word fur- 
nishes the key-note and seems to fix the thought. This 
pursuit of truth should be in a spirit of " indifferency." 
Not that we are to be indifferent as to whether we attain 
truth or not, but as to whether the truth, when attained, 
accords or conflicts with our preconceived notions. For 
only the truth thus gained can stand the test of time, and 
it alone is worthy of our suffrage and homage. 

The entire absence of prejudice from the mind is neces- 
sary to our being able to behold and to adore the form of 
this beautiful goddess. 

When Bacon undertook to render his race that valuable 
service in his Novum Organum in the destruction of idols, 
we can all sympathise with his iconoclasm. His idols of 
the den, of the tribe, of the market and of the theatre — 
all these were pre-occupations of the mind in the view of 
that great thinker, arising from the weaknesses of the indi- 
vidual, from the preconceived prejudices that attach to 
our race, that spring from association and from theory; and 
his aim, in slaughtering these false objects of devotion, was 
not to purify the temple of nature, — no, he knew the tem- 
ple of nature to be pure ; but, it was his thought, to purify 
the temple of the human intellect, which is so preoccupied 



[io 5 ] 

with falsities and filled with chaff that the educator may 
well listen to the aphorism, that the best way to keep chaff 
out of the bushel is first to put in the wheat itself, The 
only spirit that becomes the teacher or the pupil, then, is 
one of simplicity and docility. 

What use shall we make of the truth? The value of 
truth is in its uses. There is just one point here to which 
the attention of educators is briefly asked. Is it truth pur- 
sued or truth possessed that disciplines and feeds the 
mind? This is one of the most subtle and vexed ques- 
tions of which we have any knowledge. Some of the 
brightest intellects have held, that it is not the attainment 
but the pursuit of truth that gives mental vigor and discip- 
line. Even the great Paschal says that truth possessed is 
as dead game. 

What does the hunter care for the game ? It is the 
pursuit in which he is interested. 

Shall we acquiesce simply in defference to authority? 
Is it true that truth is like the dead game? Is it not the 
fact rather that truth is a living reality? 

A little less than a year ago Mark Twain, a Missourian, 
delivered a lecture in New York City on Idaho, and among 
other quaint things said in that lecture was this : That 
Idaho was an extraordinarily fine country for hunting. 
"Why," said he, "you can go forth in the morning and, if 
you take a telescope with you, you may see perhaps a 
mountain sheep in the distance, too far off for the range of 
your rifle ; and you may hunt from morning till night 
without killing a thing. You are not likely to get any 
game, but as a country for hunting, there is nothing like 
it." 

Just so in educating the mind, these brilliant theorists 
hold that it is the pursuit and not the game that gives 
attraction and utility to the work. 

I beg to withdraw from that brilliant throng and to 
take the opposite stand, resting upon the conviction that 
it is the actual possession of truth that strengthens and 



[io6] 

disciplines the human mind. It is by getting into pos- 
session of this food that the soul is nourished. The 
truth is the food of the human soul. Constituted as it is, it 
requires truth. It is only when nourishment is taken into 
the system that its growth is accomplished; and so, it is 
only when the truth itself is actually acquired, when the 
mind is brought into possession of it, that we can expect 
our pupils to show evidence of growth or strength. 
Hence, in the pursuit of every department of knowledge, 
if this principle is to be useful, we expect to get beneath 
the shuck and shell and to the corn and the kernel. If we 
teach languages, shall we teach them as gymnastics ? or 
as embodiments of food for the soul ? 

Throughout the entire domain of knowledge, it is not 
the form but the substance that makes alive ; and when 
we come back from the most extended excursions, it seems 
to me that we can the more fully appreciate the fact that 
truth is one in all its phases. Take our position wherever 
we may on the circle of knowledge and we find every 
radius leads to one common centre. 

There is just one thought more. In reference to the 
work with which I happen to be associated in your state. 
I feel compelled to make the confession, in this connection, 
that I «m satisfied that the University of our state must do 
one of two things. It must either have largely increased 
resources to sustain its pretentions as a University and to 
accomplish its assumed work, or else it must come down 
from these high pretentions to a business level and be a 
very different thing from what the public expect. 

I think that the people of Missouri have not as high 
expectations as perhaps they would be justified in having. 
If we, as a state, undertake the work of educating our 
youth, shall we not prepare the means of placing before 
their minds the best possible nutrition ? I am at present 
committed, and daily committing myself, further and 
further to the project of obtaining largely increased en- 
dowments. I do not see how any adequate provision 



[107] 

can be effected except by a change in the present consti- 
tution, and that requires faith and hopefulness. 

To seek a change in the constitution appears a very 
disheartening enterprise, but sometimes things apparently 
impracticable are worthy of our efforts. Very often for- 
lorn hopes go forward to prepare the way for those who 
come after. But we are all standing in nearly the same 
position. It is not simply the University, but the whole 
educational system of the state, that appears to be in a 
tramelled condition, Therefore, all who would aid this 
work, must stand in the ranks of the army of intelligence 
and light. By our coming up to the work before us 
and appreciating the toil that may be necessary, the public 
will surely come bravely to our relief and raise the educa- 
tional work of our state to an exalted place. 

In the medley sung this evening, a snatch from one of 
the songs of Moody and Sankey was given from " Holding 
the Fort." 

A few weeks ago, at the Palmer House in Chicago, 1 
was introduced to a gentleman whose name was given as 
General John B. Corse. A person who was moderately 
observant, would notice that his cheek had suffered from 
the loss of a portion of the bone, and that one ear was 
mutilated. During the war, General Corse commanded 
under General Sherman, and when General Sherman was 
advancing upon Atlanta he reached a critical point at the 
time when General Johnston was relieved by General Hood. 
General Corse commanded the fort where the supplies of 
the army were placed and Hood made a furious and deter- 
mined assault upon his position, carrying some of the out- 
works. The smoke of the battle so completely enveloped 
this assaulted party that in the midst of their suffering 
they lifted a signal flag to indicate their distress, but no 
word of cheer came to them, till at last, through the rift of 
lifting clouds, they saw the flag of the commanding Gen- 
eral with these words on it : " Hold the fort ; we are 

coming." And upon the afternoon of that day, General 
Sherman came to their relief. And so, my fellow 



[io83 

workers, may we not look on ourselves in this work of 
education in which we are engaged, as holding the fort 
and courageously performing our duties. We hope, 
at no distant time, to see the public lifting to our view the 
signal fanner with these cheering words, "Hold the fort ; 
we are coming." 

We expect of the publiG, in order to make the work of 
education a success, that it will come in its strength and 
that it will give us the encouragement and support that we 
need. And then the future demands of us will be fully 
met, in the honest performance of our proper tasks. 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — I received a pos- 
tal card about three weeks ago, stating to me that I was 
allotted fifty minutes on the programme. I have more 
than filled my time, and have endeavored to fulfill my task. 
I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your kind attention. 



THE LINCOLN INSTITUTE. 



The Colored Teachers Convention, \ 
Jefferson City, December 28th, 1876. j 

The regular order of business being suspended, Dr. S. S. Laws, 
President of the University of the State of Missouri, was invited to 
address the assembly. Dr. Laws said: 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — 

It affords me sincere pleasure to meet your body. I 
have done so, prompted entirely by a desire to subserve 
the interests of education in this state. I have but one 
idea as a citizen of Missouri, and as occupying my present 
official position, and that is the University of the State of 
Missouri in its relations to the interests of education in all 
its departments in this State. I think your people deserve 
to be encouraged in the work of separate education in 
which they are engaged. This institution in which you 
are assembled, the Lincoln Institute, symbolizes that work 
in this State, and I have pleasure in making a statement to 
you which will probably take your presiding officer by 
surprise. One of my colleagues, Professor Cole, was 
formerly associated with Principal Mitchell in the State of 
Ohio in the common school work there, and he reports to 
me that he is a good scholar and a gentlemanly man and 
a man to be highly respected. I think you are to be con- 
gratulated, therefore, in having associated with your educa- 
tional work a person who seems to be entitled to your con- 
sideration and your confidence. 

Now, the first point which I wish to speak of more espe- 



[no] 

cially is one that greatly interests me, and it has reference 
to the interest which your people are taking in this State in 
this subject of education. The other day, in the city 
of Mexico, one of the curators of the institution with 
which I am connected, made to me this statement : " That 
he was surprised that there was scarcely a colored person 
in that place that had not given attention to letters so as to 
be able to read and write, and many of these are fifty or more 
years of age." Why, it is notorious that white people, if 
they grow up to thirty or forty years without education, 
rarely learn to read and write. I will furnish you an illus- 
tration of the fact that your people are taking an interest 
in this thing and that the spirit of education is diffusing 
itself among the young and the old. Just before leaving 
home, I recollect going into the kitchen and there seeing 
Amanda, our servant, with her little girl sitting on one 
side with her book learning to spell and learning to read; 
and I have no doubt that she herself, a mother of a family 
of children, two of whom she is sending to the school 
of one of your teachers now before me, has learned to 

read within a few years past. 

This convention itself is an evidence of this spirit being 
amongst you, and I feel surprised that there are so many 
persons here, and that there are about thirty teachers in 
this convention from different parts of the state. I see one 
before me that I met in the class-room in Kansas City, 
and I there witnessed some of his class exercises. One 
item which he had written on his blackboard was the defi- 
nition of a. "bill" in a business transaction at a store; an 
additional exercise was given while I was there of a busi- 
ness character requiring a knowledge of figures. A prac- 
tical turn was evidently given to the instruction, But I 
heard that there is another colored school in Kansas City, 
which is conducted by a female teacher, to which his gal- 
lantry as well as his sense of justice would no doubt lead 
him to make concessions. That also is spoken of as an 
excellent schooL, and even as superior to his. 

I see another teacher here, a teacher of a school in the 



[Ill] 

place in which I myself now live, Columbia, Mo. On first 
meeting him and getting into conversation,he informed me 
that he had known me in Fulton when quite a boy and I 
know well the gentleman who still lives there, of whose fam- 
ily of servants he then constituted a member. He has since 
been at school in Ohio, taking a course at Oberlin, and he 
tells me that he intends to return and expects to complete 
the course of that college in a year. I urged him to do 
so, for there are so comparatively few of your people who 
have taken diplomas, showing a thorough course of educa- 
tion in known institutions, that you yourselves and the 
public will recognize those as men of mark to be looked 
up to and relied on in important interests and exigencies, 
who shall have the industry and courage to avail them- 
selves of such advantages. 

The second point to which I shall call your attention is 
the importance of self-reliance. This personal quality we 
endeavor to keep before youth as a matter of primary im- 
portance. It is the oak that sustains the climbing vine ; it 
is the strong who ever support the weak, and it is only by 
the cultivation of those powers with which nature has 
endowed us that we can expect the attainment of the 
social, moral and political strength to which, by nature, 
we may be entitled. Be true to yourselves in the cultiva- 
tion of those endowments which you may possess, and 
this unfolding of the attributes of nature will give you — 
will impart a vigor not possible otherwise. 

Now, I think that the work of education, as it is lodged 
in your own hands in this state, is in such a condition in 
genera] as to tend to cultivate self-reliance on }'our parts 

In our political system the general government does not 
organize education ; it is the patron of education and has 
been since before the adoption of the constitution — since 
the ordinance of 1787. It has largely bestowed its lands, 
resources and means that they might be organized into the 
work of education. So, here in Missouri, land was given 
on the organization of the State from which was realized 
the Seminary fund which founded the Missouri State Uni- 



[112] 

versity. So, these agricultural colleges, industrial schools 
and military schools, contemplated by the act of 1862, 
illustrate the point that the general government acts as the 
patron of education. But in our political system the body 
that organizes the work and institutions of education, is 
the State; so that in looking after your interests in Mis- 
souri, thoroughout the state, it is to the exercise of the 
powers of the State that you should look in shaping your 
work so far as it may depend upon a local foundation. 

The school laws of the State do not seem at all satisfac- 
tory, and there are certain movements pending in the 
benefits of which all will doubtless share alike. Whatever 
the law, it is a matter of primary importance that it act with 
impartiality toward all citizens. The paper which was 
read just before I rose to speak, which is of the nature of 
a memorial to the commissioners of schools now met in 
this city, has reference to the management of your schools, 
and speaks of white teachers in colored schools as enjoy- 
ing a preference, and of some sort of grievance arising 
out of the circumstance, that the claims of colored teach- 
ers to employment in colored schools have not been satis- 
factorily considered. I have no hesitation in expressing 
the opinion to you, whatever it may be worth, that in view 
of the fact that, in this State, you are separately organized 
in the work of education, if there is a satisfactory com- 
pliance with the qualifications particularly prescribed, then 
the teachers of your own color should have the preference 
in colored schools. And if you are suffering from any 
disabilities or grievances on the score of not having a part ; 
or even preferences, in your own schools, when equally 
well qualified, let me suggest that you stand quietly, firmly, 
intelligently and respectfully upon what seem to be the 
rights of the case. Sooner or later, you will find that 
everything will equalize itself, and the results that would 
seem most essential and desirable in the case will flow 
from such prudent and effective labors in that direction. 
Nothing is better suited to cultivate your self-reliance than 
the doing of your own educational work and doing it well. 



— tj 



[H3] 

Then you have something to which those of talent may 
honorably aspire. 

I shall ask your attention, in the third place, to a propo- 
sition which is somewhat novel, and yet, as it stands in 
my own view, exceedingly important. 

It is simply this, that in every age of the world the 

governing class of society alone has been looked upon as 

embracing the proper subjects for education. All those 

who have been a part of the social organization, and who 

had no share in the governing of their country, have 

always been regarded as not entitled to consideration in 

the matter of education. That has been true in all ages. 

Why, in the ancient Grecian States, where slavery did not 

rest on color, it was the idea that by virtue of a man being 

a slave evidence was thereby given that the Gods had taken 

away half his mind, an expression which comes down from 

the antique times of Homer, and it is in such political writers 

as Aristotle, as you will find in his work on politics. 

And now, to come right home with this thought, I ask. 

you to open your eyes to the working principle embodied 

in this proposition ; for when you do so, you will see that 

the North and the South have alike acted upon it without 

special merit or disparagement to either. In the South, 

when your color had no part nor responsibility in the 

exercise of political influence, by the enjoyment of the 

franchise, you were never recognized as a class having 

claims to education. The reason was that you had no part 

in the government of the country as citizens. In the 

North, inasmuch as all had a share in the exercise of the 

franchise, why, public schools ^and universal education 

were the rule. And so, in the South, the whites, inasmuch 

as they alone exercised there the governing power, were 

always deemed the proper and the only proper subjects of 

education. You will perceive, therefore, that in the whole 

history of our country the North and South have acted 

under the controling influence of the very same principle. 

Therefore, as a matter of history, and as a matter of fact, 

no virtue attached to the North by reason of their popular 



[H4] 

* 

education, over and above the Southern country. Both 
alike aimed at the intelligence of the governing class and 
of that alone. The reason the North had their schools for 
the masses was their share in the political franchise. In 
the South, they had schools for all that had part in the 
franchise. But now, inasmuch as your people — and it 
matters not what may be the precise reason of it, nor 
what the causes, we assume it as a matter of fact, that, at 
the present time, inasmuch as your people are now placed 
in the posture of citizens, so that the responsibilities of 
taking a part in . the political affairs of the country rest 
upon you, by the operation of the same principle, so 
broadly embedded in human experience, you must be 
educated. 

This will at once explain to you that the interest I per- 
sonally take in the education of your people is not one 
dictated by any policy of the moment, nor by any sinister 
influence, nor by any superficial pretense. You perceive 
that the State of Missouri in providing for your education 
by law, is acting in perfect harmony with the principle 
that has been recognized by States in all ages, with the 
principle of action that has bee'n acknowledged in all the 
nations of the past — that those that have part in the gov- 
ernment of the country, must partake of its education. 
Inasmuch as you have this position assigned to you, or, as 
I heard Mr. Turner explain it some years since in an 
excellent speech at Lexington, Mo., " thrust upon you " — 
nevertheless, being upon you, then, in accordance with 
this principle so imbedded in the experience of our race, 
your education is a matter of principle with us. Every 
intelligent white man must be in favor of the education of 
your people now. It is, therefore, in perfect harmony with 
the profoundest convictions that we have of State policy, 
not to speak of higher motives, that should govern our 
national interests, that we favor the education of your 
people, and in such a manner as will promise the best 
results. In this State, your education is provided for as a 
separate matter, as it is in Virginia and other States. Now, 



[H5] 

if this is in any manner due to prejudice, if it is a senseless 
unreasoning prejudice, yet we are bound to accept it as a 
part of the actual situation ; and the more senseless, so 
much the more difficult is it to deal with. 

How are you going to deal with it? If there is no 
reason in a prejudice, it is like the attempt to battle with 
a fog bank. The more senseless it is, the less impression 
you make on it. When Napoleon's artillery was at work 
on a certain mud fort in Egypt they found that they made 
no impression ; every ball strengthened the fort instead of 
breaking it down. If it had been solid masonry, it would 
have crumbled before the fire. But it was impregnable 
because made of mud. So it is often with prejudice; the 
very fact of its being a prejudice so unreasonable renders 
it impregnable. 

Even conceding the worst explanation of the state of 
facts, still the policy of the State, in providing separate 
education, must be conceded, and I am glad to find a 
hearty response and approval in your own minds. The 
best way in the wide world, therefore, for a people to act 
in order to command the respect of men, is to cultivate self- 
reliance — respect ourselves, and then others will respect 
us. Self-reliance, I think, the veriest undergirding of 
character, and we must cultiyate it in order to command 
the respect to which we feel entitled. That respect will 
come whenever we show the qualities that entitle us to it. 
An ex-President of one of our most honored institutions 
in the East gave an utterance not long since, in a toast, in 
this form : "Character before culture and culture before 
knowledge ". It holds true of us all. 

There is a fourth point. (I made this memorandum since 
entering your hall, to be sure of putting each point 
and in order.) It is this : That teachers, as such, are not 
politicians. I am a teacher, and it is literally none of my 
business whether my pupils are sons of democrats or 
republicans; whether they themselves are democrats or 
republicans, does not form any part of my concern with 
them as pupils. What may be their political sentiments is 



[lid]. 

no more my business than what may be their religious 
sentiments. In reference to these matters, there must be 
recognized an entire freedom of choice, on the part of 
pupils, without any undue influence from us school 
teachers. This is pre-eminently true of our State schools. 
If there be a point where we might make an exception it 
would be in the denominational schools. But in no 
schools that are religious and denominational will they 
admit the spirit of proselytism or bigotry. They disclaim 
even their right to bring undue influences to bear in the 
direction of the very ecclesiastical bodies which they 
avowedly represent. And in the State schools, this matter 
stands perfectly clear in its posture. 

Allow me to make a suggestion now, which I hope you 
will take in the spirit in which I give it to you. I have no 
private nor partisan interests to serve here. I assure you, 
my friends, so long as your people allow themselves to act 
without the manifestation of independent private judgment, 
you will fail to command all the influence with the public 
to which your numbers and your culture should ultimately 
entitle you. You must break ranks and show that you are 
acting as independent citizens. I commend to you this 
broad principle of action in the work of education. That 
there is a field in which you may display this individuality 
of character. 

We must have individuality. We know that to be so, 
and what we see to be true in the case of others, we may 
rely on it holds true with us in our several spheres of 
action. Why, you may take any class of men, and if they 
undertake to act together as a class, and tyranously pursue 
any who break their ranks, do they not at once forfeit the 
respect of the thoughtful and the good ? Such dumb 
driven catte are the material which the demagogue is sure 
to find means to use for his sinister and, it may be, vicious 

ends. 

I have a fifth point noted. It is this : That personal 
worth must be looked upon by us all as the only passport 
in society. It must not be expected that, on account of 



["7] 

our color, any particular immunities will be conceded on 
the part of society with reference to defects of character, 
or improprieties of conduct of any kind. 

I hope you will allow me to venture upon a suggestion 
that I know to be exceedingly delicate. It is this : That 
those of you who are engaged in the work of teaching 
learn to clearly and fully inculcate upon the minds of 
parents, and also upon the minds of pupils, what I may 
term the true view of me7im and tmim — the true idea of 
the rights of property. This whole idea of the acqui- 
sition, possession and use of property, as an individual 
and personal fact, is with your people rather a novel one, 
and it requires a certain amount of culture and time that 
it may be so firmly grasped as to tend to the development 
and strength of your society. No society, under any 
circumstances, can prosper, no people can prosper, that 
does not respect the rights of property as no less sacred 
than the rights of person ; and it should be inculcated 
upon the minds of the young, and so perfectly ingrained, 
let us say, in youth, as they are growing up, as that cases 
of delinquency in this respect would be marked excep- 
tions; and the more considerate and wise should use 
kindly, but nevertheless firm, influence in dissipating every 
cloud in this quarter of the heavens that may overhang 
your present and your furture. Whether we be members 
of institutions of learning, in the course of our years of 
growth, whether we be ]eft to the undirected and sponta- 
neous influences of society that may gather around us, 
nevertheless, my friends, we are all undergoing processes' 
of education. It is not, Mr. President, merely those of 
your people in your schools who are in the process of 
being shaped for the future in this State, but all are under- 
going a transformation, the result of which will in due 
time appear. 

I have sometimes drawn the distinction between this 

spontaneous education from circumstances and the educa- 
tion of the school-room by the use of the words plastic 
and scholastic education. I mean by plastic education that 



[n8] 

drawing forth of personal qualities or character which, 
arises from the influences of your surroundings, whether 
in business life or in whatever occupation or calling. All 
men, in this sense of plastic education, are like the clay 
upon the potter's wheel which, by his hands and imple- 
ments, is mounded into form. These influences, encom- 
passing us, are likewise tools moulding us into shape. 
Circumstances thus mould character and determine in 
large part our future. Circumstances do not entirely 
make men, for nature furnishes the materials, but the sur- 
roundings of each individual exert upon him or her their 
formative influences. But scholastic education is the kind 
to which this institution in which we are assembled is 
devoted, and which the laws of our State organize. It is 
that education which arises from the intelligent selection 
of those means by which you may be best able to attain 
the true ends of education. It is the great aim of a true 
education to transmit to the future our civilization, in its 
best features, so that our work of education re-produces 
ourselves in the future, as a society, as a people, as a cul- 
tured member of the family of nations. 

It is because this plastic or spontaneous education is not 
adequate to the task of transmitting our civilization that 
we are reduced to the necessity of organizing our public 
and private scholastic institutions for all the people. 

To rely on this plastic education would be like leaving 
the fields uncultivated for weeds to grow up in them ; for 
the tendencies of our nature, if left to spontaneous influ- 
ences, are rather to degradation than to improved growth 
and elevation. It is only by the hand of the skillful 
trainer that has been brought to bear that we may find the 
wild vine producing the highly flavored grape, or the wild 
fruits transformed from uselessness into the lucious fruits 
that hang upon the branches of cultured trees. 

These teachers whom I meet here are by profession 
nature's husbandry. I feel that we are associated in a 
common work, that of inculcating upon the minds of the 



[H9] 

growing youth the true principles of personal honor and 
character, of right and duty, that those coming after us 
may, if possible, be wiser and better and stronger than we 
ourselves. 

I wish to mention one point of a business nature to the 
teachers, to which I think it will be proper to refer. I see 
it announced on the programme that there is an arrange- 
ment by which there is a reduction in the return fare for 
those attending the State Teachers' Association now in 
session here. I presume that there would be no difficulty 
whatever in the members of this convention enjoying the 
benefits of that arrangement. If your secretary will fur- 
nish a list of your members, I will myself bring in a reso- 
lution which will recognize this as part of the same con- 
vention. Why not? It is part of the same convention, 
meeting in a different room, carrying forward this system 
of education under the same school law. I think, there- 
fore, that there will be no trouble in having such an action 
taken in the other body as will recognize your members 
as members of the same convention, constructively, and 
without fees, as } ou have your own organization and inci- 
dental expenses. The secretary could, under such an 
arrangement, properly give certificates that would econo- 
mize your expenses in attending to this State duty. I 
hope there will be no difficulty in the way of fully realiz- 
ing this expectation. 

I am obliged, Mr. President, for the kind and unfaltering 
attention from yourself and the convention to the un- 
studied remarks which I have now made. 



A motion of thanks for the address was then unanimously passed 

b} r a rising vote, to which the response was made : 

"I most sincerely appreciate this expression." 

The next daj r the Convention of Colored Teachers took an action 

asking that the address might be published. 

The arrangement with the State Teachers' Association was effected 

by an unanimous action. 



ERRATA. 



In the address of Hon. J. S. Rollins, page 39, the poetical 

quotation — 

''And the grass green, 
From the soil of carnage names alone." 

Instead of '•'names alone,'' read " waves above." 

Page 43, same address. See two concluding lines of poet- 
ical quotation. Instead of — 



read 



" So generations in the course decay ; 

So flourish these, when those have hoped way," 

"So generations in their course decay ; 

So flourish these, when those have passed envoy." 





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